Unexplainable Pain
by LoveToTheCucumber
Summary: The ninja academy has planned for Shikamaru's class to go on a five day long excursion along with their sensei, Iruka. Shikamaru thinks it's a total drag and it doesn't get any better when suddenly he gets an unexplainable pain in his back.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: This story is rated M for later events and it does not necessarily contain any important spoilers since this is set during the first part of Naruto and I assume you already know of those things before you came to read a Naruto fic, hehe xD. I hope you're going to have a pleasant time with reading this :)!**

**By the way, a review just scolded me for not giving you guys a proper warning about the upcoming M rated events and said that I was an irresponsible author for not doing so... Now I'm not trying to be rude or disrespectful, but I'm not gonna give you the warning she /he wants me to give you because it's against my own policy to spoil people with warnings like that. It says nowhere in the rules of fanfiction that the author has to give such a warning – it only says that you have to give it a proper rating that fits it so people who for example doesn't wanna read anything M rated doesn't get any nasty surprises. When you see something is M rated, you know that it can either be due to violence, bad language or sexual contents and then you decide for yourself if you wanna risk anything by opening and reading that fic.  
So now if anyone wants a heads up when it comes to why this fic is M rated, you can go read her review because I will not spoil people who like me does not want to be spoiled either.**

**Unexplainable Pain**

**Chapter 1**

"This is gonna be a drag," Shikamaru said, crossing his arms over his chest and sulked. Naruto and Choji looked at their classmate who was obviously feeling sorry for himself.

"Come one, Shikamaru, it's not gonna be that bad. I bet it's gonna be fun. I for sure can't wait for those grilled sausages Iruka-sensei promised us!" Choji cheered the brunette who he sat next to on the bus.

Naruto sat beside Sasuke on the seats next to Shikamaru and Choji. He leaned over the armrest, closer to his classmates, wanting to feel more like he was a part of the conversation. Besides, he did not really enjoy sitting next to that Uchiha kid since he was rather silent and if there was one thing Naruto was not fond of it was silence. "Yeah, I have to agree with Choji on that. All those treats Iruka-sensei mentioned sure sounded delicious!" Naruto drooled and looked like his mind was in a different world. Choji was wearing the exactly same face as the blonde. Shikamaru just snorted and looked out of the window and away from his annoying friends.

"I don't care about food, unlike you two idiots. Excursions are never any fun. If my mother hadn't insisted so strongly, I'm sure I could have convinced my dad to let me stay at home." Shikamaru watched the passing trees, bushes and clouds. They had been on the road for hours and he was getting tired. He hated being closely packed inside a bus with his classmates. Especially Naruto. He did not particularly hate him, he just found him annoying in certain situations - situations like these where he could not escape if it all became too much for him. He sighed and tried not to focus on Naruto's piercing voice.

"It's only five days and you don't have to sleep in a tent or something like that so I don't understand why you are making such a big deal out of it?" Naruto asked confusedly. He loved these kind of trips. He was the only one who never got homesick or missed his parents, for obvious reasons. This was his way of escaping the fact that he did not have any parents. When they were on school trips, he felt like he was on the same level as everyone else.

"Naruto!" a firm voice growled their way. All three of them looked up, seeing their irritated teacher. "How many times do I have to tell you to sit properly in your seat? And I'm sure that Choji and Shikamaru can hear you without you shouting all the time!"

"I'm sorry, Iruka-sensei," Naruto said with a lowered voice. "It's not like he's any better himself," he whispered in a huff to Choji who nodded agreeably.

"Was there something you would like to add, _Naruto_? I didn't quite catch that," Iruka glared down at the orange dressed boy. Naruto just shook his head and Iruka turned around satisfyingly, looking out at the setting ahead of them. They were almost there now.

Naruto wrinkled up his nose, crossed his arms and grunted snuffly. He was not allowed to do anything. Iruka-sensei was allowed to stand up on the bus, but Naruto could not even lean away from his seat? It just did not seem fair to the annoyed boy.

He glanced over at Sasuke who seemed to be asleep. He was not, though, and Naruto had to discover that the hard way because when he poked the black haired boy, he immediately grabbed Naruto by the wrist and twisted it around.

"Argh!" Naruto exclaimed and tried to pull his hand away from Sasuke.

"Don't. ever. do. that. again. Got it?" Sasuke whispered angrily through his teeth and shot Naruto a deadly glare.

"S-Sorry," Naruto gulped, Sasuke finally letting go of his wrist.

Shikamaru watched as the blonde massaged his wrist with his other hand, not looking very pleased with the situation. "Pff," Shikamaru snorted and rolled his eyes at the hurt boy, earning a confused look from his chubby friend beside him. _He should know better than to get involved with the cynical Uchiha. That boy is a total drag, _he thought to himself before turning away to look out at the sky again.

There did not happen much for the next thirty minutes. Shikamaru was staring out the window, being close to falling asleep. Choji was having a snack and did not pack it away even though Iruka told him that he should not spoil his appetite with nutrition lacking snacks like that, he just hid the bag of chips and made sure that he was not too noisy when reaching for one of those crispy potato chips.

Naruto was trying to get the attention of the girl who sat in the seat in front of him by tugging at her long pinkish hair, but she only got mad at him and told him to stop. Her sudden out burst did not awake Sasuke - that was if he was actually sleeping. It could very well be that he just did not bother to look at them.

Finally they arrived at their destination and Iruka told them to stay calm as the bus stopped and he asked them to slowly get out of it and find each their individual bags and take it with them to the meeting place by the bonfire that was located in the middle of the camp. He did not expect them to actually listen and he was in his right place to assume that because within a few seconds all the students were up on their feet, pushing each other to be the first ones to get out of the stuffy means of transport.

Shikamaru and Choji found their bags and went to the place where Iruka had instructed them to go as two of the only ones who was actually doing what they were told. Kiba was running after Naruto in anger after the blonde had splashed water all over the other. Kiba's dog, Akamaru, was catching up to Naruto and it was barking insanely and snapping after it's prey's heels. Shikamaru found the act highly annoying.

It took almost a quarter of an hour before Iruka had managed to gather all the students where the majority of them were still too excited about having an excuse not to go to the academy for days to listen to what their sensei was saying. When Iruka had gotten everyone to take a seat on the ground, he spoke.

"Okay, since most of you will probably be tired from the relatively long bus drive, I won't force you to do much today. First thing we have to do is assign each of you to a cabin." Iruka watched as the students became disorderly again. They yelled to one another, planning who they wanted to share a cabin with. The teacher shook his head despondently before making everybody shut their mouths by shouting, "If you don't shut up right now, I won't hesitate to personally escort you back to the academy and then you'll have to write a five pages long essay on the former and current hokages!"

Iruka knew just what to threaten them with. Even though it did not always look like it, most of the students had a lot of respect for the man. They knew his threats were never empty. Well, they figured he would not send them back to the academy, but the essay was not just a threat.

"Good, now that I have everyone's attention, I'll continue. There are three bedrooms in each cabin with two beds in each room so you will be six people sharing one cabin, but you will only be sharing bedroom with one other person." Iruka cut everything out in cupboard. He knew that was necessary because boys like Naruto was on the trip too and he hated having to explain himself twice. "You're allowed to choose yourself who you want to share a cabin with, but if I find it essential to relocate any of you, I will do it in a second. So, choose wisely. Oh, and I will note allow mixed cabins," Iruka said and placed his hands on his hips, watching as everyone began to pair up.

It did not take long for the students to pair up in groups of six and Iruka noticed that most people were in the groups he had already foreseen. He was a little worried about Ino and Sakura sharing a cabin, though, but since there were not many girls in the class, it simply could not be helped. He sighed when he saw that Naruto had not found a group yet and was sitting by himself, looking at his feet with a sad expression on his face.

Naruto hated when Iruka did this. When they had to find into groups themselves, Naruto was always the last one to be placed into a group. It was embarrassing. He could not help but notice, though, that he was not the only one left without someone to share a cabin with. Sasuke Uchiha was standing with his arms crossed over his chest, looking like he could not care less if he was one of the only ones left to be placed. But Naruto was not stupid. He knew if they had been allowed to share cabins with the girls, Sasuke would not have a hard time finding someone to be with. The only reason why he was not in a group now was because most boys were either afraid or jealous of him and therefore no one bothered to ask him if he wanted to join them. Naruto wondered for a moment if he should ask him to pair up with him, but he brushed the thought away pretty quickly. He did not really feel like sharing a cabin or room with Sasuke, the oh so awesome and handsome yet to become ninja who all the girls adored – including the girl who held Naruto's affection. Sakura Haruno.

Shikamaru looked around at the different groups that had formed around them. Everyone seemed to have paired up in groups of six except for them. They were only four. He sighed heavily when his eyes fell on Sasuke and Naruto who were the only ones who were not in a group yet. _Great, now they have to stay with us. What a total drag! _he thought and nudged Choji's shoulder gently with his own. He got the point across pretty quickly and Choji nodded approvingly.

"Hey, Naruto," the brunette in the fishnet shirt shouted towards the lonely boy whom sat a few meters away from them. His head shot up immediately and he looked at the person that was trying to get in contact with him. "Wanna share a cabin?" Shikamaru asked, trying not to put it in a way that would only make Naruto feel like a burden. He saw how Naruto's big blue eyes suddenly lit up like colored lights at Christmas time and he nodded eagerly, instantly getting up on his feet and walking over to the now group of five. Shikamaru might have been one lazy ass, but he did have a heart after all.

"What about Sasuke?" Choji whispered to his slightly shorter friend.

"Nah, don't bother. Look around, he's the only one left and our group is the only one missing one person. Iruka-sensei is gonna put him in our group no matter what anyway." Choji stared at Shikamaru for a moment, trying to figure out what was going through his friend's mind. He had an idea of what it could be, but he was not sure.

Shikamaru put one hand on his hip and waited for the inevitable to happen. Everyone knew that he was not particularly fond of the Kyuubi kid, even though he did not know that he in fact contained the nine-tailed fox within him, but he could not help but feel sorry for the hyperactive knucklehead at times. Times like these, especially. Shikamaru was not exactly a popular guy himself, but he was not unpopular either. And he had Choji. Naruto had no one.

Sasuke, on the other hand, was an arrogant idiot. Shikamaru had nothing but scorn for that boy. The girls loved him, why, Shikamaru could not figure, which annoyed him boundlessly because he was usually the one with all the answers – as long as he actually bothered to answer. He thought it served Sasuke right to try, if just for once, to be the one left to stand alone.

Shikamaru turned out to be right, as always. Iruka asked Sasuke to join Shikamaru and his group and after that the different groups were assigned to a cabin each. The girls' cabins were smaller than the boys'. There was only room for four girls in each cabin.

Iruka told them to go to their cabins, unpack only their shared stuff and then wait for him to turn up and tell them what to do next. Within a few minutes, the meeting place was deserted and everyone had gone to find their cabins.

Shikamaru, Choji, Kiba, Shino, Naruto and Sasuke went to cabin "4." All of them, except for Shikamaru, had no idea of why Iruka had indirectly told them not to unpack their private things, but they did not really give it much thought and when they were done with unpacking the food and such, which the school had provided them with, they sat around in the free space in cabin "4," waiting for their sensei to show up.

The atmosphere was rather oppressive around the six academy students. No one said anything to each other. The only one breaking the silence was Naruto who had gone to the kitchen, which was integrated with in the living room, to make water for the extra instant ramens he had brought along with him. With the enormous usage he had of ramen, the school would not be able to feed both him and the rest of the students and apparently he had been smart enough to figure that out himself. That boy could not live without his daily ramen. Instant noodles were not as good as the ones they made at Ichiraku Ramen's, he had to admit, but it was better than nothing at all.

Just when the pre-genins had started to feel very impatient, Iruka finally appeared.

"Hey boys," Iruka said and glanced around the room quickly. Adding a "I see you've gotten comfortable already," when he lay eyes on the ramen eating boy who was finishing his third cup already. Naruto's cheeks turned a slight reddish color and he smiled widely at his favorite sensei with noodles hanging from the corner of his mouth.

Iruka asked them all to come sit on the long couch while he would explain to them how things were going to work out during this trip. Iruka sat on the edge of the coffee table that stood by his students with his legs stretched out and crossed in front of himself. Naruto, Kiba, Choji and Shikamaru's eyes widened and Iruka did not understand why they were staring at him like that.

"Iruka-sensei, you are sitting on _the_ _table,_" Naruto pointed out, stressing the last two words. Iruka looked down at himself, discovering that he had broken one of his own rules. He always told his students not to sit on the tables since it was impolite, unhygienic and it made you look like you were indifferent about everything and it seemed like you were trying to act cool – all high and mighty – which you _were not,_ according to Iruka. He wanted to face palm himself at that moment, but knew he could not lose his composure in front of his students.

"That's right, Naruto. That's the biggest difference between being a student and being a teacher. _You_ can't sit on the table, but _I_ can." It was not hard for the boys to see through Iruka's act and he knew it. He was desperately fighting back a blush that threatened to take over his cheeks, knowing that it would only make the situation even worse for himself.

He figured it was better to just get on with what he was really there for and cleared his throat before speaking.

"As most of you have probably already guessed, the reason why I did not want you to pack out you personal things yet was because you don't get to decide who you share your bedroom with." Shikamaru was surprised to hear Choji, Naruto, Shino and Kiba gasp at what Iruka said. It was a not a brainer, how could they not have seen that one coming?

Shikamaru pricked up his ears; he could have sworn that he heard the person sitting next to him whisper something under his breath. Something sounding like, "Idiots." _There you had it_, Shikamaru thought, _that damn arrogant attitude. _

The stunned ones of the boys all crossed their fingers, hoping that they were put in the same room as their closest friend. "I've already decided who sleeps with who. Shino," Iruka started, "you will be sharing your room with Choji."

Choji was sad that he did not get to sleep with Shikamaru. He was sure that they could have had a lot of fun and long talks at night. But Shino was not the worst one he could have been paired up with. Sasuke was the last one he wanted to share his room with. That boy scared him a great deal.

Choji sent Shino a small smile, but the beetle boy did not change his expression, he only nodded slightly and Choji knew that that meant he felt the same way. He would probably rather be with Kiba, but Choji was not the worst to be stuck with out of the group of boys.

"Naruto, you and Kiba," Iruka continued, but did not get to say another thing before both Naruto and Kiba jumped up from the couch.

The blonde and brunette pointed at each other, exchanging challenging looks. "Not him!" they screamed in chorus. Iruka stood up at looked down at the two rivals.

"This isn't up for discussion. Sit!" he demanded high-handedly, but the two boys did not react immediately. They kept staring at each other intensely before snorting and sitting back down unwillingly. Both had to swallow their pride.

The sentence Shikamaru was best known for ran through his mind over and over again as he glanced at the black haired boy from the corner of his eyes. This meant he was going to share his room with _him._ Sasuke did not seem to have any reaction to Iruka's statement, though, so Shikamaru decided not to let anyone see how he felt about the situation either. He felt even sorrier for himself now.

"Okay," Iruka looked from Kiba to Naruto who both sat with their noses pointing upward with dissatisfaction written all over their faces. It did not seem like they were going to take up their quarrel again and Iruka figured it was safe to continue. He sat down again. "And of course that leaves Shikamaru and Sasuke. Now that you've been divided, you can go ahead and pick whatever room you want, but please, don't start fighting over them. They are all one hundred percent a like, I promise. Once you have made your beds and unpacked, you're free to do whatever you like until five o'clock where we all gather again at the meeting place. Understood?" They all nodded, some more lazily than others. Iruka smiled happily and was just about to leave them to themselves, already standing in the doorway, when someone behind him tugged his shirt lightly. He raised one arm and looked under it, discovering that it was Naruto who was trying to get his attention.

"Uhm... Iruka-sensei... can I... uh... talk to you for a moment?"

"Huh? Yeah... sure. What is it, Naruto?" Iruka could not interpret Naruto's expression. Either he looked sad or else he was pouting over something. Or maybe a mix of them?

"I wanna speak to you in private if that's possible," Naruto were almost whispering. Iruka was kind of surprised to see Naruto acting like that all of a sudden, but he granted him his wish nonetheless and they walked off together.

Choji and Shino went into their room to unpack their stuff right away. Kiba knew that Iruka had meant that it was not voluntarily to choose if you wanted to unpack or not before going out to have fun, but he did not care and was out the door the second Iruka and Naruto was out of sight. He threw his bag into the room beside Shino and Choji's room before going, though.

That left Shikamaru and Sasuke who had not spoken one single word to each other in years. _This is such a drag, how the hell did I get stuck with him? _Shikamaru wondered as he for once took the initiative and walked to the only room that was left to be taken. Their room was the one furthest away from everything, the only room that was located opposite the others' bedrooms. Shikamaru was not exactly happy to be placed with Sasuke to begin with, but now he had to share _that _room with him, he suspected that it was going to feel like he was cut off from the world and that he had to spend all of his time with the cold Uchiha now that they had gotten the room that was sort of isolated from everything and everyone else.

Sasuke did not follow Shikamaru. As Kiba, he left without unpacking, probably off for training or something. That was always his idea of fun, at least that was what it looked like to Shikamaru after having observed the boy for several years. He did not particularly take note of Sasuke, he never had, but Shikamaru was a very observing person so he did not have to be interested in people or study them to know how they were like and what they usually did in certain situations.

In the meanwhile, Iruka and Naruto had reached a spot that was far enough away from the camp for them to talk under four eyes. Iruka thought Naruto seemed a little uneasy, he could tell something really was on the boy's mind.

"That's far enough," Iruka stated and stopped. "So, what was it you wanted to talk to me about?" Naruto fidgeted with his fingers, something he rarely did. He kind of reminded Iruka of Naruto's fellow student, Hinata, though he still did not appear nearly as nervous as she did at all times.

"I-I was just wondering i-if maybe you could put me in another room?" Naruto asked carefully, not looking up at his sensei.

"Huh?" Iruka was surprised to hear the words his student spoke, he sure had not expected anything like that. "That's all?" Naruto nodded slightly, still playing with his fingers. "No, I can't do that, Naruto," Iruka stated flatly though firmly.

"What, why not?" The boy looked up at his sensei with big, begging eyes. He almost looked heart broken and Iruka figured he was overdoing it on purpose in order to make him give up on his decision.

Iruka squatted down so he leveled with his student, the eye contact between them remaining. He sighed loudly and sent Naruto a small yet sad smile. "Naruto, I know Kiba can be kind of harsh towards you at times, but..."

"At times?" Naruto cut him off and shouted out loud, "Kiba is an idiot! I hate him and I don't understand why you have paired us up, we're gonna kill each other before the end of the day!"

"Calm down, Naruto, you shouldn't speak like that about you comrades. Kiba doesn't always treat you well, but you're the same way towards him, you know. And there's a reason why I placed you all like I did. "

"I don't care! I won't be able to sleep tonight because of Kiba and his stinking dog. They smell worse than a sewer! I bet his own mother doesn't even like him, everybody hates him. He's..." Naruto's eyes widened when his cheek suddenly started burning. Instinctively, he flung out at Iruka, but stopped right before hitting him, realizing what he was about to do. Iruka had not attempted to dodge the fist that was coming at him, he stood in the exact same squatting position as he had before.

Naruto knew he deserved that slap Iruka had given him and lowered his chin to his chest in shame. Not protesting any further. Iruka wanted to comfort the yellow haired boy, but he knew he had to be strict with him since he was the only one around in the boy's life to do so.

"Naruto," Iruka said calmly. Naruto hated how Iruka always Naruto-ed him. He had done it numerous times during their conversation already and he just would not stop. It was something Iruka always did and it made Naruto feel like a little kid. "As I said, there's a deeper meaning with the way I paired you. I knew you were all going to seek into your normal group of friends once I gave you permission to choose your housemates yourselves, but I also knew that your groups rarely consist of more than two to three people and therefore you had to live with people you don't usually talk with no matter what. I thought you all would be more comfortable with living with your friends, but I didn't want you to lock yourselves away and not give any of your other classmates the chance to talk to you so I decided to put you with people that you don't normally talk with in hope of that you work things out anyway and maybe become better friends. There are more than one aspect to this trip. One of the hidden ones are about teamwork and that's actually one of the most important lessons of this trip. Do you understand, Naruto?" Naruto stood in his place for a minute without doing anything, but then he nodded slowly. He was not always able to follow what Iruka was saying because he always had to give long speeches without pausing to catch his breath or allow Naruto to reflect over his words. It was tiring for Naruto's mind and he had a hard time with putting the pieces together when it was all spoken in one long sentence.

"I understand," he said in a low voice.

"That's good. You know, this exercise is actually for your benefit. You shouldn't waste your chance." Naruto did not like when Iruka was being so straight forward about it, but he knew he was right and he decided to just nod yet again. Iruka put on a small smile, stood up straight and placed a hand on Naruto's shoulder, causing the boy to finally look up at him. "I think I brought some instant ramen with me. Wanna join me for a cup or two?" The smile on the teacher's face grew wider and Naruto could not help but smile back. Iruka was not all bad. In the end, he was the best teacher a student could ask for. "But first," Iruka added, "you have unpack you things." Naruto's smile quickly faded. Yeah, he knew it had been too good to be true. Iruka could not help but chuckle at the changing expression on the younger boy's face.

The students got to do pretty much whatever they wanted to do for the rest of that day. At five, they all meet by the fireplace, which Iruka had already lit. They were each handed a bamboo stick before various meat, vegetables and dough for twistbread were served. Iruka was happy to discover that so far the trip was a success and everyone seemed happy. Even Naruto had someone to sit with. He and Choji seemed to be getting along pretty well, at least when there was food involved. But Iruka wondered if they were going to end up fighting when they would eventually run out off supplies?... Nah, Naruto could not possible eat as much as Choji. He would be done way before they could get to that point.

When everyone had finished eating, Iruka taped a piece of paper to his cabin. It was a list of names and appointments for when the different students were going to help him clean after meals and such.

"Remember it by heart because I won't accept the old "I didn't know that it was my turn" excuse," he said and everyone seemed to understand that they were not going to be able to get around cleaning at some point.

By the time Iruka was done with everybody, the sun had already set and he thought that it was for the best to call it a day. Everyone was tired anyway.

All the students went to their cabins and got ready for bed, but they had other things in mind than sleep, though. Some of them had already decided to met up once Iruka had gone to bed and stay up for a little while longer. Everything was always so much cozier and funnier when it was night and you were not allowed to still be up.

Kiba and the girls had been the ones to plan this and unfortunately for some, they had also decided that this was going to take place in cabin "4." Shino, Naruto and Choji did not mind. Shikamaru was not too fond of it, but went along anyway because Choji did. Sasuke was the only one who did not want to participate. He went straight to bed to the girls' deep disappointment. The only reason why they had wanted to meet up in the boy's cabin and not their own was because then there was a bigger chance that Sasuke would actually participate. Kiba had of course offered his cabin immediately and did not ever consider asking the rest of his roommates if they mind or not. Considerate as always.

Sakura, Ino and Hinata were the only girls who had showed up, the rest of them were too scared to go against Iruka's will. Hinata had not been sure if she should do it or not to begin with, but when Ino had told her that Naruto would be there too, she did not need another second to think it through, she was definitely in. Ino did not understand, though, why she wanted to participate all of a sudden, but she was just happy that she got one other girl with her besides from Sakura.

Almost as soon as they had gotten there, they began making warm chocolate for everybody. The boys did not complain.

Once they were all gathered around the coffee table, they started talking about the various events that had occurred that day and most agreed that it had been really fun. Shikamaru did not say much when being in that part of the conversation since he was sure that Iruka-sensei would have something troublesome in store for them the next couple of days.

Ino and Sakura kept asking if Sasuke was not going to join them, but none of the boys cared about Sasuke and did not even mind to go and ask him. They had offered him to join once and he declined, they did not need to make a fool of themselves in front of him more than necessary. The girls would become all fangirly anyway if he came out of the room and none of the other boys wanted to have to hear to their never ending speeches about how awesome Sasuke was.

Hinata sat beside Naruto. Her cheeks had been flushed constantly ever since he had placed himself beside her. She found the situation nerve racking, but she enjoyed sitting so close to him that she could smell him. Naruto was ignorant – he had not even noticed that it was Hinata he was sitting beside. The only one he was focusing on was Sakura who did not deign to look his way.

Shikamaru observed how everyone failed to woo their chosen ones. It was so obvious to him that it was sickening.

Kiba were doing tricks with Akamaru just for the girls. They were impressed, clapped and did all those polite things you had to do, but none of them meant anything by it. Sakura and Ino were mostly sulking over the lack of Sasuke's company while Shikamaru noticed that even Choji was trying to come on to one of the girls. _Not you too, Choji, _he thought and lowered his head dejectedly.

Out of all the girls in their class, why did he have to choose Ino? She was only going to hurt him if she ever noticed what he was doing. She was the girl who always teased him about being fat, which only made it worse when he tried to win her over by offering her chips. How could he fall for someone like that? Not that Sakura was any better and Hinata was... well... Hinata. Regardless of the other girls, it still seemed unlikely that Choji would fall in love with someone like Ino. At least that was how Shikamaru saw it.

"Hey girls, look what I teached Akamaru here the other day!" Kiba said excitedly.

"Sakura, if you want more cocoa, you can have mine!" Naruto shouted with a big smile on his face.

"Aaaah, why won't Sasuke join us?" Ino and Sakura whined in unison.

"Uhm, Ino, what's you favorite flavor?" Choji asked, pointing at his almost empty bag of chips.

Argh, Shikamaru's head was killing him and he swore to himself that if his head was not going to do the job, he would make sure to end his life himself if it was going to continue like this. Especially since everyone was so incredibly ignorant!

Shikamaru kind of wished that he had done the same as Sasuke and just went straight to bed. He had even prepared his evening glass of water and had put on his nightclothes and everything. The water was probably getting tepid by now.

He remembered Naruto asking him what the water was for before he had placed it on the nightstand in his room and the blonde had laughed him in his face when telling him that it was a ritual he had because he believed that if he drank one glass of water before going to bed, he would sweat out all the bad and toxic substances he had consumed throughout the day during the night. He knew it sounded stupid and it actually was, it was just an old habit that he could not get rid of again. The habit was kind of OCD like to him. He would not be able to sleep properly without drinking the water first.

Suddenly, someone cleared his throat and everyone turned their attention towards the door. "Would anyone care to explain why you are not all lying in your beds?" Iruka asked with a raised eyebrow. He seemed mad, but Naruto was almost sure that he could see a small smile tugging at the side of his teacher's lip.

And that was how their night was ruined. Well, Shikamaru considered himself saved, but all the others appeared to be down about being sent back to bed.

When the girls had gone back to their cabin, Iruka made sure that all the boys were lying in their beds before going to check on the girls.

"Naruto, what did I tell you about those hands?" Iruka said annoyingly, tapping on foot impatiently. Naurto sent him a puzzled look and placed his hands on his stomach on top of the wadded quilt.

"See, Iruka-sensei, I still don't get why I have to lie like this? It's cold, why can't I have my arms and hands underneath the quilt?" Naruto asked perplexedly. He did not notice that Kiba, who lay facing the wall, was snickering at Naruto's stupidity and innocence.

"It doesn't matter, just keep your hands there all night, okay? Same goes for you, Kiba." Unlike Naruto, Iruka had heard the suppressed giggles coming from the other boys bed.

"Sure, Sensei," he giggled and Iruka decided that he had to be satisfied with what he had gotten. Those two were the last ones of the boys Iruka had to check on before moving on to the girls and so he did. He had known from the very beginning that they were going to meet up, but he had not wanted to stop them right away since he too remembered how it was like to be as young as them. But that did not mean that he was going to allow this every single night. This was a one-time exception.

Shikamaru threw the shirt, which he had put on when hearing that the girls were coming over, onto the floor, drank his lukewarm water and went to bed. At the moment, he hated his mother for forcing him to come along on this excursion. It was a drag indeed.

**oOo**

"You're such a slacker, Shikamaru. If we had had someone else on the team we would have been done with this in a split second, which is exactly how long something like this should take!" Naruto yelled impatiently towards the brunette who was even further behind than Choji was.

"Come on, Shikamaru, let's just get this over with," Choji said encouragingly, but it did not change Shikamaru's pace. It was not that the logs Iruka had asked them to get for the fireplace for later use that was too heavy for Shikamaru, he just could not move in his normal pace because of the pain in his back. The weight of the log sure did not make it any easier.

"I told you already. My back is sore!" he shouted back to Naruto irritably, but the blonde would not hear any of it.

"That's just a bad excuse, slowpoke! Now get moving!" Naruto turned and moved on, not waiting for his two other classmates.

Choji stood still until Shikamaru reached him and then walked along side him. He really did look like he was in a lot of pain.

"Do you want me to take some of those?" Choji asked, referring to the logs. Shikamaru just shook his head. He was not going to make Choji do all his work just because he had slept badly. "Does it really hurt that much?" Choji sounded sincerely concerned.

"Nah, it's not like I'm gonna die. But yes, it hurts a great deal. I have no idea of what the hell I've been doing in my sleep. I'm beat. It must be those sucky mattresses they have here," Shikamaru complained, walking forward slowly, nearly loosing his balance when accidentally stepping on a lizard that was wandering around in the bottom of the wood.

"You probably just need a good stretching. When we get some free time, I can ask Iruka-sensei if we can go swimming in the lake?"

"No, I think I'm good. All I need is rest." _Hopefully,_ Shikamaru mentally added. The pain was almost unbearable at times. It was not normal to have such piercing pains in your back and loin. It seriously felt like someone was performing a very bad session of acupuncture on him. Oh well, he just had to keep a stiff upper lip and get through the day the best he could.

Shikamaru sighed loudly. Who was he trying to fool? No matter how you looked at it, this was a complete and total drag!

**oOooOooOo**

**Taking a break from Anything Else? and this is what came out of it.**

**This chapter was sort of an introduction to the characters, their relationships with each other, the setting and the upcoming events. For once, I tried to make the chapter a decent length – almost 7000 words, wuhuu :D!**

**This story is going to be around 4-6 chapters. I'm not completely sure yet since I've only written 3 chapters so far, but time will show how long it's going to get xD... **

**The next chapter will be uploaded on Wednesday since I need time to write the rest of the story and look the chapters through so it won't suddenly take me weeks to update. (Also, I need to take care of Anything Else? … It's not that I've given up on it – not at all ^^!) I plan on keeping the 3 day updating pace so I hope that the length of the chapters make up for that :)!**

**(If it bothers you that I do not use contractions in other than direct speech, I can't do anything else than apologize sincerely. My English teacher doesn't allow contractions in other than direct speech so I'm just trying to get used to it...)**

**I hope you enjoyed the story so far and are looking forward to the upcoming chapters.**

**See you on Wednesday!**


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

"Shikamaru, you're falling behind again. Get going!" the highly annoyed sensei yelled from the opposite end of the line of students that Shikamaru was walking behind. "We won't get back to the camp until the sun sets if we don't speed up the pace a little!"

"Yeah, yeah, I hear you," Shikamaru miffed, mumbling so his sensei would not hear that he was answering him back. Choji and Naruto were walking just a few meters in front of Shikamaru, they were the only ones who actually seemed to want Shikamaru to get back to the camp in one piece. Everyone else was far ahead of them, not caring to wait for the hurt pre-genin.

But Naruto was getting impatient. He had never been good at waiting or sitting still for too long, but he held back his fit of temper and suppressed the urge he felt to yell at Shikamaru and ask him to start walking faster since he was still grateful to the brunette for asking him to join their group that first day at the camp. "Hey, Shikamaru, do you think you could walk just a little faster? We are getting far behind the others and I'm kind of hungry," Naruto asked carefully and both him and Choji stopped to wait for Shikamaru to catch up with them.

"I can't, I told you that already! My back is killing me." Shikamaru never managed to walk up beside them before his legs collapsed underneath him and he fell on all fours.

"Are you okay, Shikamaru?" Choji asked and squatted down beside his friend.

"What does it look like? I'm tired of walking and this bag doesn't exactly better my situation now does it?" Iruka had taken the students deeper into the woods in order to find herbs and special stones that they would later have to analyze and everyone had to bring back what they had found themselves. Which meant the bag on Shikamaru's back only got heavier when adding those things from the woods to the lunch pack and big, full bottle of water he also had in his bag.

"Do you want me to take it for the rest of the way?" Shikamaru shook his head as an answer to Choji's offer. His back might have hurt, but he was not going to look weak in front of everybody by letting others carry his stuff. On the other side, everyone thought of him as a lazy ass so maybe they would not put that much thought into it? He considered taking Choji up on his offer for a minute, but then dismissed it again. No, he could do this himself.

"Get up." The brunette who was on his hands and knees looked up, seeing an aggravated Iruka standing right in front of him, tapping his foot impatiently. "We aren't going to waste any more time on you, Shikamaru. Sasuke will lead the class back to the camp and I'll stay in the back with you and make sure that you don't slow us down any further. Now, get on your feet!" Great, now Shikamaru would have his sensei watching him like a hawk for the rest of the way. He really wished that he had agreed on giving Choji his bag, but now it was too late. Iruka would probably not approve of it and he would just get furious and call him lazy as he always did.

Shikamaru pushed himself back onto his feet and started walking, Iruka being right on his tail - so close that Shikamaru could practically feel his teacher breathe down his neck. They did not get long, though, before Shikamaru had to stop to catch his breath again.

"No breaks, get moving!" Iruka demanded and shoved his students hard in the back. Shikamaru moaned and grimaced because of the pain Iruka caused him.

He walked on for a little longer without whining loudly, but after a few minutes he stopped again and Iruka lost his patience with him. He had been like that for the entire day and Iruka was not the only one who was getting tired of his act.

"Fine, you win," the teacher said and paused to twist his bag so it hung in front of his stomach instead of on his back. Shikamaru looked at him with only one eye open, the other was closed in pain.

"W-What are you doing?" Shikamaru panted heavily, stooping a bit so he could place his hands on his thighs to support his upper body.

"I can't force the other students to wait for you any longer so I'm taking matter into my own hands." Iruka turned on his heels and squatted down in front of Shikmaru. "Get up."

Naruto bit his lip so he would not break into an uncontrollable laughter and Choji's cheeks blew up with air for the same reasons. Shikamaru looked at his sensei's back in horror. There was no way he was going to let Iruka give him a piggyback ride.

Iruka looked over his shoulder and back at Shikamaru who was holding both his hands up and shaking his head. "No, thank you, I'm fine, I can walk!" he said quickly, almost stumbling over the words.

"You should have showed me that earlier, it's too late now. Get up, _now_!" Iruka growled and shot Shikamaru a provoked look. He did not dare to do anything else than what his sensei told him. Not after he had used _that_ tone with him.

He glanced at his two friends who were still struggling to hold back their laughter and sighed loudly before crawling onto Iruka's back, avoiding all eye contact in shame.

"Good. Now, everybody, full speed ahead!" Iruka shouted and started walking with rapid, long steps. Choji and Naruto did not dare to anger their sensei any further so they had to walk even faster to keep up with him.

When Shikamaru was no longer holding the others back, everything went a lot smoother and faster. They were back at the camp in no time and Iruka told all the students that they were free to do whatever they wanted while he and the few students that had kitchen duty prepared dinner.

Shino and Kiba immediately went into the woods again. Kiba wanted to train Akamaru now that he finally had the chance again and Shino had noticed that the woods contained a lot of interesting bugs, some of them which he had not even seen before, so he went along to explore the fauna further.

Choji, Ino and two other students was on kitchen duty and went to help Iruka with preparing the food while Naruto, Sakura, Hinata and Shikamaru stayed behind with nothing special to do.

Shikamaru sat down on a stub, gritting his teeth in pain and placing one hand on his lower back. Naruto thought he looked like an old man when acting like that and so did Sakura who giggled at the sight of the hurt Shikamaru. Hinata was the only one who looked at him with eyes filled with concern.

"S-Shika-m-maru?" the short haired girl stammered shyly and looked down at the moaning brunette. He glanced up at her quickly, then away from her again.

"What is it, Hinata?" he asked indifferently. He had to admit that he was a little surprised to hear her speak since that girl rarely said anything. Especially not to him.

"I-I m-might be able t-to help y-you with your b-back." Hinata blushed slightly and started fidgeting with her fingers as she always did when speaking or being spoken to.

Shikamaru wanted to say that he did not need any help and that he was fine, but the girl had to have a reason for asking and he did not want her to make her feel uncomfortable or unwanted so he just asked, "How?" instead and tried to sent her a small smile, but failed at doing so.

"I-I always help my s-sister whenever her m-muscles are s-sore after t-training. I-If you w-want me to, I-I could m-mas-s-sage y-you?" she stuttered heavily when glancing over at Naruto while speaking to Shikamaru. When her eyes met with the yellow haired boy's, she flushed even more and looked back at Shikamaru immediately. Naruto did not get the hint.

Shikamaru seemed to be thinking her offer over and over in his head. He did indeed had a sore back and he would do about anything to ease the pain. A massage sounded like a good idea and at this point he did not really have anything to lose. If she could make the stiffness leave his back, he would not have to suffer for the rest of time the excursion lasted.

He then nodded and followed her to the girls' cabin, Naruto and Sakura walking along with them. On their way to the cabin, Naruto wondered if he could make Sakura give him a massage too. He tried to imagine what it would feel like to have her hands all over him and he could not help himself from smiling perversely at the mental picture.

"Hey, Sakura, my shoulders are kind of sore. Do you think you could give me a massage as well?" Naruto asked, keeping his real agenda a secret.

The answer was pretty clear to him when Sakura sucker punched him in the stomach, causing him to bent forward and gasp for air. "Keep on dreaming, Naruto!" she shouted furiously and stomped her way to the cabin.

As soon as Hinata and Shikamaru reached the cabin, Hinata removed everything that stood on the dinner table and placed only one pillow from the couch there instead. She motioned for Shikamaru to lie down and so he climbed onto the table, pulled off his jacket and fishnet shirt and laid down on his belly with his face pressed down into the pillow. Hinata blushed a little at the sight of Shikamaru shirtless, but she regained composure pretty quickly.

The brunette had heard about the jutsus of the Hyuuga clan and therefore knew that they could work wonders with their hands. Or... actually they worked the opposite of wonders, but he figured Hinata knew what she was doing and that she could not make it any worse than it already was.

She then began massaging him. It hurt more than Shikamaru had first counted on. Especially in some certain points in his loin, but he could also feel that her touch forced his muscles to loosen up and figured that in time it would stop hurting and in the end turn out for the better. Whoever said getting massages were a joy?

Naruto watched as Hinata worked her way up Shikamaru's naked back and wished that Sakura would not be so starchy towards him and he decided to try and ask her for a massage again, but he only managed to turn his attention towards her and open his mouth before he received a glare that could not be misinterpreted and he gave up on the spot.

The sounds Shikamaru made at Hinata's touch caused her cheeks to remain red throughout the entire massage and they did not turn back to normal until she was finally done with him. Shikamaru jumped off the table and began stretching and twisting his body.

"Thanks, Hinata, that actually helped quite a lot!" he said surprisedly and smiled at her. "I'm still sore, but it's definitely better."

Hinata nodded, but there was barely enough movement for them to be able to see it. She smiled back. "Y-You're welcome. Y-You w-won't feel so s-sore tomorrow." Shikamaru nodded back at her happily and put on his clothes again.

Naruto was still watching the two of them while Sakura had gone to sit on the couch, reading some random book she had brought along with her. If Naruto could get Hinata to massage him, then he would have an excuse to take off his shirt in front of Sakura so she could see what an awesome physic he possessed and maybe the fact that it was Hinata and not Sakura that was touching it would make her jealous and then she would want to massage him as well?

The orange dressed boy giggled to himself and smiled widely. In that case, the massage from Hinata would only be a bonus since it had sounded like Shikamaru liked it quite a lot.

"Hey, Hinata?" Naruto exclaimed suddenly and got eye contact with the pale eyed girl who blushed madly at the sound of her name coming from the boy who held her affection.

"Y-Yes... N-Naruto?" she fiddled with her hands and stared into the blue eyes of her chosen one.

"Could you maybe give me a massage like the one you just gave Shikamaru?" he was still wearing that wide smile of his, though it faded when the girl in front of him suddenly stumbled backwards, her knees trembling. Before you would have been able to snap your fingers, Hinata had fainted, her head being just about to connect with the floor when Shikamaru came to her rescue.

He held her in his arms when looking up at Naruto, sending him a questioning look. Both boys shrugged their shoulders.

"Don't worry." The boys' attention turned to the pink haired girl on the couch. "She does that all the time."

Shikamaru was still worried that it was something serious, but if Sakura said so, he guessed there really was not anything to worry about. He asked Naruto to help him with carrying her to her bed. They left the girls' cabin once they had brought Hinata to her bedroom safely.

Soon after Shikamaru and Naruto had gone back to the meeting place where Sasuke was using his fire style jutsu to light up the bonfire, unintentionally impressing a bunch of female students that stood around the fire, looking at him like he was some kind of God.

Shikamaru and Naruto sat down far enough away from the others for them to be able to speak in private.

"What's so great about Sasuke?" Naruto asked, glaring at his rival who did not pay any heed to Naruto at all.

Shikamaru clicked his tongue, "I often ask myself that too. He might have a pretty face, but how could anybody fall for a shitty personality like his?"

"Beats me." The two of them watched as Sasuke succeeded in lighting the fire and the girls started cheering crazily. Sasuke just pretended like it was nothing and walked away from the fireplace, not caring that all the girls started fighting over who could form a sentence that best described just how awesome he was. Shikamaru rolled his eyes and sighed loudly.

"Naruto," he started to get his classmate's attention. "Please, don't ever turn into someone like Sasuke to make Sakura fall in love with you." Shikamaru sure did not waste any time with wrapping up what he really meant in polite phrases and such. For Naruto, he was a little too straight forward and it made him blush.

"Don't worry. I'm never going to be anything like Sasuke," Naruto hissed under his breath as he followed his eternal rival with his eyes.

Soon after, the food was done and everyone was called to dinner. It did not take any of them very long to finish their meals since they were all very hungry after the long hike Iruka had forced them on that same day. It was not until everyone was done and had started leaving the table that Iruka noticed that someone was missing.

"Where's Hinata?" he asked Ino who was just about to finish the last pile of dishes.

"Sakura said that she wasn't feeling well. She's still in our cabin," Ino replied and wiped off the last plate.

"Oh," Iruka looked over at the table where what was left of the buffet stood. He should probably get Ino to deliver a plate of food to Hinata now that she was sick. He turned around to ask Ino if she would do him that favor just to discover that the blonde haired girl had already taken off to meet up with her friends. He guessed he had to take it to Hinata himself then. It was not like he had anything else to do at the moment and Ino deserved a break after being so focused when making the others dinner.

Iruka had no idea of what Hinata liked to eat so he just gathered some different food onto her plate until he was satisfied with the mix. It look like a healthy plate of eatable things that would provide her with most of the vitamins, proteins, fats, calories and so on that she needed. He then went to the girls' cabin to hand over the food to Hinata with a self-satisfied smile on his face .

All the lights were out in the cabin except for in one room. Small rays of lights escaped from under the door and Iruka figured that that was where Hinata was so he walked over to it and opened the door, not being prepared for what he was about to see.

Hinata shrieked loudly when her sensei barged into her room and laid eyes on her almost naked body. The Hyuga girl was only wearing small panties.

"Kami!" Iruka shouted, quickly closing the door again. "I-I didn't see anything!" he lied, putting his free hand to his face to cover his embarrassment. Hinata was dead silent behind the door Iruka was standing up against. She took a few seconds to recover from the shock before putting on the silk button up shirt she had held in her hands when Iruka entered.

Suddenly the lights were flipped on in the living room and Iruka saw Sakura and Ino standing at the door, glaring accusingly at him. "What do you think you're doing, sensei? Are you peeking at Hinata?" Ino scolded at Iruka, walking towards him with heavy, threatening steps. Sakura copied her classmate's moves.

"Yeah, sensei, haven't your mother taught you how to knock?" Sakura joined the conversation. Iruka held one hand up in front of his face, palm facing towards the two mad girls and he shook it.

"N-No. That's not what I was doing. It was an accident!" he said nervously.

"They all say that!" Ino growled through her teeth, gnashing them.

"Get out of our cabin, you closet pervert!" Sakura grabbed the plate in Iruka's hand and jerked it away from him and pointed towards the door.

"Girls, calm down," he tried to sound as a reasonable authority, but he was not exactly in any place to do so and the girls knew that.

"We said get out!" they shouted in chorus, both shoving Iruka towards the door before finally kicking him out of the cabin.

Never in his life had Iruka seen those two get along so well as they did at that moment, neither had he ever imagined to get shoved around by students. He was so embarrassed about himself, but he knew what had happened was just an accident and he was sure that once the girls calmed down they would realize that as well. With flushed cheeks, a hurt male pride and a sore behind, he strolled back to his own cabin, thinking that everything would feel normal again with time.

Most students spent the rest of their free time outside by the bonfire and did not split up until it was time to go to bed. Iruka was at every cabin for almost half an hour because every time he went to a new cabin, it turned out no one had made themselves ready for bed yet even though they were supposed to actually be in their beds by the time Iruka showed up. He gave them all a small lecture in discipline even though he knew that none of them were actually listening to what he was saying.

When he had been to the last cabin, he returned to his own and made himself ready for bed as well. The students were not the only ones who were tired and Iruka was sure that he was going to fall asleep almost right after closing his eyes. He turned out to be right about that and did not even notice the dog and its owner that stood on a branch outside his window, watching him.

"Come, Akamaru, time to get the girls," Kiba whispered to his dog that was wagging its tail happily.

Shikamaru had gotten up after Iruka had left. He was not ready for bed when his teacher showed up, but his mind was too exhausted to listen to the lecture he was sure that Iruka would give them once he found out they were not ready for bed yet and therefore he had decided to jump under his quilt and pretend to be sleeping. He was the only one in his cabin that had been in bed when the lecture started and because of that he felt smart.

He took off his clothes and pulled on his check patterned night pants. Everyone was always teasing him about his sleeping wear since they thought only old men wore check patterned clothes. Shikamaru could not care less of what they thought, though, and brushed their laughs and insults off easily. Even Choji was giving him a hard time about it, but that was in a more friendly way than the others.

When he was ready to go to bed, he grabbed the glass of water on his nightstand, which he had brought to his room just before Iruka had come, and was about to drink all of it in one mouthful when Sasuke entered the bedroom.

Shikamaru looked at the black haired boy from the corner of his eyes. Sasuke was staring, for a reason unknown to Shikamaru. He lowered the glass and frowned when turning his full attention towards Sasuke. "What?" he asked peskily.

Sasuke kept staring at him for a few seconds without saying anything. "The girls are coming over again. Just wanted to let you know." Shikamaru was stunned every time he heard that kid talking and he had to blink his eyes quickly a few times to take in the fact that his roommate was finally speaking to him. Only then he realized what it actually was Sasuke had said.

"Man, what a drag. I bet Choji is counting on me to participate," Shikamaru placed his full glass of water back on the nightstand and got up on his feet. "So, are you going to bed now... or?" Sasuke shrugged his shoulders and looked away from Shikamaru.

"I might come for a few minutes," he said and walked over to his bags, pulling out a shirt and put it on. Either he was shyer than Shikamaru had first thought or else he was bright enough to figure out that the girls would not be able to focus if he did not cover his torso. Sasuke then disappeared into the living room.

Shikamaru looked at the door Sasuke had used to exit the bedroom. That boy was acting rather strange, but Shikamaru did not give it much thought since Sasuke had never seemed that normal to the brunette anyway.

His gaze wandered to Sasuke's bag that was still wide open. That was when his eyes fell on something unusual and Shikamaru could not stop himself from walking over to the bag and pick up the white bottle that lay in it.

"Sleeping pills?" The sticker on the bottle said that the pills was prescribed especially to Sasuke. Shikamaru had never imagined that Sasuke had troubles with sleeping. Maybe it was because he was always on alert? Could it have something to do with the slaughter of his entire clan? At least it explained why Sasuke had not awoken the night before when Shikamaru had finally returned to bed even though he was rather noisy.

The brunette took a quick look around the room to see if anyone had entered without him noticing. He was alone.

Slowly, he unscrewed the lid of the bottle and took one of the pills. Sasuke would probably not notice if one of them were missing and Shikamaru thought that even if he did, then maybe he would be able to understand why Shikamaru had taken one. His back still hurt and he was not sure that he would be able to get any sleep because of the pain, but if he took one of these, he was sure that that would help him sleep.

He threw the bottle back into the bag, stuffed the pill into one of his pockets and went into the living room to meet with the rest of his cabin.

The girls arrived shortly after all the boys had gathered around the coffee table. Hinata was with them as well. She had finally recovered from the shock Naruto had given her when asking her for a massage.

Ino and Sakura was excited to see that Sasuke had finally decided on participating in the nightly events along with them. No, excited was actually an understatement; they were beside themselves with joy! Hinata was the only calm one of the girls. She settled with glancing at her love once in a while.

Kiba walked into the cabin with a big grin on his face. "Iruka-sensei is still sleeping, we shouldn't have to worry about him much tonight. He seemed pretty tired. So, what do you wanna do?" he said, obviously directing his words towards the girls.

"I know, why don't we play a game of spin the bottle?" Ino said with excitement, clapping her hands. Sakura and most of the boys nodded agreeably. Hinata only gave a small nod. She was not very fond of these kinds of games since they usually ended up getting her embarrassed, which was actually the purpose of the game so it should not come as such a big surprise to her. It did, though. Every single time.

Shikamaru and Sasuke were the only ones who did not give a response, but they went along with the majorities wish even if they were not that thrilled about it themselves.

Naruto got his water bottle and filled it with water before joining the circle the others sat in already, placing the bottle in the middle of them.

"I'll start because I came up with the idea," Ino said and spun the bottle without any protests coming from the others.

The dares that followed the game started out with being relatively innocent, but the level of the dares increased as the game went on. The game had finally taken the turn that two of the girls had been waiting for and which was also the turn that that kind of game usually ended up being about. Kissing.

Kiba had just been challenged to kiss Ino's hand by Hinata and he had done it without a problem. Hinata never liked this part of the game. She was not as mature as the others yet and her hormones was not as conspicuous either so whenever she dared someone to kiss another, it was always on a rather innocent parts of the body.

It was Kiba's turn then. He took the bottle and gave it a good spin. When it finally stopped spinning, the bottle was pointing at Shikamaru, the only thing going through his mind being, _what a drag_...

Kiba's vicious grin grew wide and he started laughing, none of them understanding what was going through that complicated mind of his.

"Shikamaru, I dare you to kiss..." he started and looked around at everyone in the circle. Not stopping his eyes from gliding over his fellow students until they landed on a certain black haired boy. "Sasuke."

"What? No way!" Shikamaru shouted, shaking his head wildly. There was no way in hell that he was going to kiss a boy. Especially not when the boy was Sasuke.

"Where?" Shino asked, ignoring Shikamaru's protest.

"On the lips," Kiba added into the bargain, laughing wickedly. Shikamaru glared at Kiba. This had to be because he had refused to let Akamaru be a part of the game. Kiba was seeking revenge.

Shikamaru looked around at everyone within the circle like Kiba had done it. Naruto was giggling, Choji seemed to feel sorry for his brown haired friend while Sakura and Ino were sending him deadly glares like it was his fault that he had to kiss Sasuke. Hinata was the only one who looked like she was going to enjoy the sight of two boys kissing. She looked kind of expectant, even though she tried to hide it. She could not, though, because she was blushing.

He then turned his attention towards Sasuke who sat silently beside him. He was looking kind of terrified, the same look as Shikamaru himself wore. Sasuke raised one brow at the dared boy, his look appearing almost warning.

"What are you waiting for, Shikamaru? You know you're not allowed to exit the game when it's yourself who is being dared. Get on with _the kissing,_" Kiba teased, lifting his upper lip so his sharp eyeteeth became visible, which only made him look even scarier and more evil.

"I despise you. You know that, right?" Shikamaru said flatly and kept glaring at Kiba.

"I know and frankly I don't care." Shikamaru sighed loudly and looked at Sasuke who surprisingly enough had not run away. He did not look very happy, though, because he was probably aware that he was going to have every single one of the male pre-genin in the room on his tail if he tried to escape the kiss. Shikamaru wondered if they would actually be able to overpower Sasuke. He doubted it.

"Oh man," Shikamaru grimaced and gulped when realizing what he was about to do. He thought he had finally figured out why Sasuke was still sitting in his place. He probably did not want to be called a scaredy-cat for the rest of his academy years. Shikamaru felt the same way. Being called lazy was one thing, but being known for backing down from a challenge was something entirely different even if it was just a stupid game of spin the bottle.

Shikamaru placed his hands on the floor for support so he would not suddenly fall into the kiss as he leaned closer to Sasuke. Everyone was staring intensely at them, though for various reasons. Shikamaru felt how his cheeks began to heat as he got closer to Sasuke. He had closed his eyes, but when he took a peek out to determine the current distance between them, he noticed that the pale boy he was about to kiss had a slightly red face as well. At least Shikamaru was not the only one who found this extremely embarrassing.

He puckered his lips, as a child does when kissing its mom, just before his lips connected with his roommate's. Kiba immediately rolled onto his back and laughed out loud. Shino tried to calm him down so he would not wake Iruka-sensei and get them busted. All the girls, Naruto and Choji gasped at the sight.

Shikamaru was the first one to pull away from the kiss and he quickly got back into the same position he had sat in before kissing Sasuke. Both boys were looking down at their playful hands that lay in their laps. Their faces were completely pillar-box red.

When Shikamaru was finally back to normal, he spun the bottle, wishing that it would end up pointing at Kiba so he could do the same thing to him, only that he would ask him to kiss Naruto. He could not imagine that there was anything worse that he could make Kiba do. Naruto would probably protest and get mad at Shikamaru for dragging him into their fight. Kissing Kiba was probably the worst thing for Naruto to do too. He was not that lucky, he discovered. The bottle was pointing at Choji. Oh well, at least he got to help his friend a little. He of course asked him to kiss Ino.

The game went on for a little while longer, but took a new turn after Hinata had been dared to kiss Naruto and ended up fainting before she got the chance to go through with it. Ino apparently did not think that the game was exciting enough, which was probably due to the fact that no one asked her to kiss Sasuke, and was with out a doubt tired of seeing trivial people kissing.

None of the boys ever considered asking either of Sakura and Ino to kiss Sasuke because they knew that the girls would end up pulling each others' hair out or something. Sakura and Ino would obviously not ask each other to do it, which meant they had to count on Hinata, but she of course did not dare because she knew both girls liked him and that the one she did not ask to do it would hate her guts forever and throughout all eternity.

Ino spun the bottle and it landed on Sakura this time. She smiled savagely at the pink haired girl who was afraid of what Ino might dare her to do. Would she ask her to kiss that bug freak, Shino? Or even worse, would she ask her to kiss Naruto? Sakura glanced over at Naruto who was evidently hoping for Ino to ask Sakure to do just that. "Well, well, what do you know," Ino started, the smile only growing bigger. "So, Sakura. I have one final dare. At least that's the final one for you."

"What is it, Ino-pig?" she asked irritably, hiding the fact that she was actually nervous of what Ino had come up with.

"I dare you to sleep next to Iruka-sensei tonight." Everyone looked at Ino with widened eyes and jaws were dropping to the floor in one big symphony.

"W-What?" Sakura was not able to hide her feelings any longer. She had not expected anything like that. That was even worse than when Kiba dared Shikamaru to kiss Sasuke.

"And!" Ino added. "You have to give him a goodnight kiss."

"I think you're taking this a little too far," Naruto said and Choji and Shikamaru agreed with him.

"No? A dare is a dare and she should do it. Sasuke kissed Shikamaru. If he can do that, she can do this too. Unless she's a chicken?" Shikamaru hated how Ino said his name in disgust when it was mentioned along with Sasuke's. Ino looked at Sakura with a raised eyebrow and that evil smile that was plastered to her face.

Sakura glanced at Sasuke who sat with his arms crossed over his chest. He thought Ino's dare was stupid, but like all the other boys, he could not help himself from being slightly curious. The dare was in a whole other league than all the others were after all. It was a bit exciting.

The two interacting girls noticed how all the boys were looking expectantly at Sakura, even Hinata was giving them that rummy look, though she too looked a little concerned - unlike the boys.

"B-but how am I supposed to get to sleep beside him?" Sakura stuttered almost horrifyingly. "And I'm not sure that it's such a good idea. Don't you remember what he did to Hinata?" Hinata blushed at the mention of the days earlier happenings. A memory that she would rather be without.

"Huh, what did Iruka-sensei do to Hinata?" Shikamaru asked perplexedly and all three girls looked at him.

"That pervert took a peek at her when she was changing!" Ino said furiously.

"What?" all the boys yelled at the same time, looking at Hinata who did not dare to look up from her lap anymore.

"Did he do anything to you, Hinata?" Shikamaru was concerned about her. He was aware of the fact that she was an easy target. Though, he had never expected Iruka-sensei to be the kind of pervert to take advantage of that.

"N-No..." she murmured. "Iruka-sensei didn't d-do it on purpose. I-It was an a-accident." Shikamaru was not sure if she was telling the truth, but he did not really have any other choice than to believe her. Besides, Ino and Sakura were known to exaggerate things frequently and Iruka did not appear to be a pervert so if it was just an accident, he figured that it fit the bigger picture better.

"Anyway, Sakura, are you doing it or not?" Ino was starting to become impatient. She hated Sakura more than anyone else and she would love both to see her back down from a challenge, but in this case she would not mind seeing her actually doing the task too. It was a lose-lose situation for Sakura, which meant this was a win-win for Ino.

"How am I supposed to make him do it?" Sakura had no idea of how to get out of the dare without making herself look bad in front of Sasuke. What she did not know was that Sasuke did not take the game as seriously as people like her, Ino and Kiba did so he would not really be impressed even if she did do it. But how was she supposed to know that?

"Sakura, don't do it," Naruto advised sadly, but Ino hushed at him angrily.

"How would I know? Tell him you're homesick or something. It's your job to figure out how to do it. Not mine!" Ino got up on her feet and crossed her arms over her chest, looking down at Sakura who was in two minds about what to do.

"But it's not fair, I won't be able to participate in the game anymore then."

"That's right, Sakura. But I'm tired of this game anyway so I don't care to go on with it after this." Ino snorted.

"What about you?" asked Sakura who was still hoping for someone to rescue her. The boys all looked indifferently about it. They did not really care if the game continued or not and they all kind of wanted to see what would happen if Sakura decided to take on the dare.

In the end, Sakura had to admit defeat and they all went along with her down to Iruka's cabin. Everyone besides from Sakura placed themselves in places around the cabin so Iruka would not notice them. At night, and especially when he was tired, his senses would not be as sharp as they normally would. They should be able to stay and watch the show.

Sakura looked around, still not wanting to go through with it, but she felt like she had to and she was not good with group pressure. No one dared to really go against Ino's will. At least they did not want to know what would happen to them if they got in the way of her plans. She just had that kind of power over men.

Slowly, Sakura walked up to the door and knocked on it carefully. She was not comfortable with doing this at all. Not just because of what had happened between Iruka and Hinata earlier, but he was way older than her and he was her teacher, not her father or some peers she had a crush on.

A few seconds went by before someone started walking around inside the cabin. Iruka yawned loudly, he could barely keep his eyes open and he was getting goose bumps from the cold wind that entered his cabin as he opened the door.

"S-Sakura?" he said with his sleepy voice and yawned yet again. "What are you doing here, you should be in bed." At first, Iruka did not understand why the pink haired student was not answering him - not until he noticed that she had frozen up and was staring at his body in horror did he realize what was wrong with her. He had forgotten to put on clothes so he was only standing in his tight, black boxers. That explained why the night had felt as cold as it did.

He mentally slapped himself for his mistake, this was definitely not going to make her think of him as less of a pervert.

"Two seconds." Iruka went into his cabin and did not return before he had put on his white robe. Sakura then finally snapped out of it. "Now, tell me what you are doing here in the middle of the night," he cleared his throat, feeling slightly more awake than before.

"I-I'm homesick," Sakura said carefully and clung to her upper arm with one hand, which only made he look even more insecure.

Iruka blinked a few times in confusion before putting on a small smile and chuckled lightly. "Oh, that's all. I'm sure you parents are missing you too right now. We're going home in a few days, do you think you can hang in there until then?" Sakura nodded and tried to figure out what to do next. She had always been kind of afraid of Iruka because she had witnessed how short tempered he was at various occasions. She did not want to push the wrong buttons. "That's good," he said and patted her shoulder. "Come, let me follow you back to your cabin." Iruka stepped out of his wooden shelter and was just about to close the door behind him when suddenly Sakura started sobbing.

He cocked his head and stooped a little so he was able to see her face, which her hair covered when she her head was lowered.

"Are you okay?" he asked with care in this voice, placing one hand on her shoulder.

"I don't wanna go back there, Iruka-sensei!" she cried and covered her face with her hands. Her act would be ruined if he saw that she was not crying. Iruka was more than just slightly surprised to witness Sakura crying. Not that it she had not done that before, he just did not expect her to be crying over homesickness.

"I'm sorry, Sakura, but there's not much I can do at this time a night. Let's go back to your cabin."

"No! Ino has been very mean to me lately and I just want to go home. I miss my dad!"

"What?" Ino whispered, "Oh no she didn't... Well played, Sakura. Well played."

"Shh!" Sasuke hushed irritably. Iruka was not a complete moron. If they were not careful, he would notice them in a second.

Iruka squatted down in front of Sakura and held her by her upper arms. "I know Ino can be kind of harsh at times." Ino snorted when hearing her own sensei saying that about her. "But you know that she doesn't always intend on sounding so tough." Sakura nodded at Iruka's comforting words and struggled to get the tears to flow. What did she have to think about to make herself cry?

Naruto started pouting. What Iruka said to Sakura sounded suspiciously a lot alike what he had told him about Kiba. Was this just his way of dealing with annoying students? Stupid Iruka-sensei.

Iruka made yet another attempt at taking Sakura back to the cabin, but she resisted by pulling the other way. This felt so wrong to her.

"Can't I stay with you for a while, s-sensei?" she was getting more and more nervous with every second passing by.

"Huh?" Sakura kept surprising him. She was a suck up to her teachers indeed, but that was about it. She did not come crying to them if she had problems. Ino had to have been really rough with her this time for her to come to him.

Iruka put on his most worried look when Sakura looked up at him with tears in her eyes. She figured out that all she needed to think about in order to cry was a world without Sasuke. "Come in," he led her inside his cabin and closed the door after them.

"I never imagined that she would actually do it and I never thought she would get this far," Ino said in surprise, a bit disappointed that they would no longer be able to listen in on their conversation. All they could do now was watch them through the windows.

"This isn't worth watching," Sasuke said flatly and jumped off the branch, which he had been sitting on with Ino, without further warning and he went back to cabin "4." Ino was disappointed that he did not stay and watch the incident with her, but it was all too exciting for her to care about flirting with Sasuke. The rest of the group stayed back with her and watched as Sakura continued trying to complete her mission.

Shikamaru was reminded of his sore back when standing in that squatting position on the thick branch. It had not exactly been easy for him to climb it either. He considered going back to the cabin too when he saw Sasuke trudge off, but decided that it was best for Sakura if he stayed. He was probably the only guy there who would be willing to step in if she took it too far or if it turned out that Iruka-sensei really was a pervert.

**oOooOooOo**

**Iiiiiiiiit's update tiiiime :D!**

**As promised, here's the seconds chapter^^**

**Thanks to you who have reviewed, I really appreciate that!  
Whoever is reading this, hope you find the story interesting – the next chapter will be up on Saturday.**

See ya' :D!


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

Sakura sat down on Iruka's bed, still crying her crocodile tears. Iruka took time to make them both a cup of hot chocolate and none of them said anything until he sat down in front of her on a chair, passing her one of the cups. He hoped that it somehow would get her mind off whatever it was that was upsetting her.

"So, what happened between you and Ino?" he asked, taking a sip of his cocoa.

Sakura held the cup with both hands and did not look up at her teacher as she spoke, "She called me names and said that I was the ugliest girl in school." She sniffled, but Iruka just smiled at her and chuckled in a cheering way.

"Sakura, you know that that's not true. You're one of the prettiest girls in school and lots of boys hold affection to you." Sakura felt like sticking her tongue out in disgust when hearing her sensei call her pretty. There was no doubt about it. He was one big pervert. Iruka, on the other hand, did not notice that his words upset the younger girl even further. He meant nothing with it, he was just trying to make her feel better.

"That's what you're supposed to say," she said dejectedly and let a few tears roll down her cheek. Iruka's smile turned into a pitiful one and he looked down at his cocoa as well.

"I'll talk to Ino tomorrow if that's what you want?"

"Thank you, Iruka-sensei." Sakura heard a small voice inside of her head burst out into an evil laughter. _Take that, Ino-pig, cha!_

"You can always come to me if you have a problem. Now, stop crying and finish your cocoa." He caressed the top of her hair soothingly and sent her a contagious smile. Sakura nodded and drank of her hot chocolate.

When they were both done, Iruka took her cup and put both cups into the sink. All that talking had made him tired so he did not really feel like cleaning them at the time. He would do it first thing in the morning.

"Let's get you back to bed," he said as he started looking for his sandals. Sakura was running out of time, she was so close though still so far away from finishing her challenge. But how the hell was she supposed to get him to sleep beside her? She got up from the bed and walked over by him, looking at him as he made himself ready to go.

"Damn it, they are leaving! Hinata, we need to get back to bed immediately," Ino said and jumped down from her branch, all the others following her lead. They all ran up to the girls' cabin and positioned themselves. The boys crawled up into the tree that stood right outside the window of the bedroom which Sakura and Ino slept in. The boys convinced Hinata to stay with them since the possibility of Iruka going into her bedroom was small and therefore it was unnecessary for her to miss out on the fun. There was no way that Iruka would not notice if Ino was not in her bed so she ran into her bedroom and crawled under her quilt, practicing how to appear to be sleeping.

Iruka and Sakura arrived to the cabin shortly after and everyone made themselves ready to watch the on going show.

Iruka was happy when he saw that the lights in the girls' cabin were out and there was not any noise coming from any of the rooms. Also, Ino was lying in her bed as she was supposed to. At least now he would not have to force everyone to go back to bed yet again. He only needed to get Sakura settled. If only Iruka knew that a pair of bright blue eyes were watching him from their hiding place under a quilt inside the moon lighted bedroom. Ino was lucky that her spot was safely hidden in the dark.

The man with the high ponytail watched as Sakura got into bed and got herself comfortable. They sent each other a short smile and he told her goodnight before turning around to leave. She had to think fast or else she would be losing the dare. That was when she remembered Ino's words, _"I dare you to sleep next to Iruka-sensei tonight." _She did not have to sleep next to him in _his_ bed. All she needed to do was to make him stay.

"Iruka-sensei?" she whispered innocently and he looked at her over his shoulder.

"Mmm?"

Sakura thought about what to say for a few seconds before continuing, "W-Would you stay here with me until I fall asleep?" Iruka raised one brow at her, not understanding why she wanted him to stay.

"Uhm, sure?" he said confusedly, closed the door that still stood open from when they first entered and walked back to Sakura. He grabbed a stool, which stood in there already, and placed it on the floor in the corner of the room right by Sakura's bed. He sat down on it and looked at her for a minute or two before his eyelids began to feel heavy and his eyes began to close automatically.

"Do you think she's going to make it?" Choji asked when seeing that Iruka was practically already asleep.

"Nah," Kiba replied, "I think the show ends here. She did a good job, though." The others agreed with him; there was not going to happen more that night.

They were just about to jump down from the tree when suddenly Sakura got up from her bed with her quilt wrapped around her. Apparently she was not going to give up that easily and the group of students in the tree remained in their places.

The pink haired girl walked over to her teacher who was already half asleep. She gulped loudly and was careful when making her next move. There was no way in hell that she could predict how he would react to what she was about to do.

Slowly, she crawled onto his lap, arousing him in the process.

"S-Sakura, what are you doing?" he whispered in a mix of astonishment and bewilderment. Sakura did not answer him, just swung her legs to one side so she could sit properly on his lap. She pressed her upper body against his and nuzzled up against his neck, taking some of the quilt with her when she put one arm around her sensei so he would be covered by it too even if it was just a little.

Iruka did not know what to do about his impertinent student, but he eventually decided to just wrap his arms around her. Once she had fallen asleep, he would put her back into her bed and go back to his cabin. Sakura grunted happily when Iruka laid his head on top of hers and gave her quick reassuring squeeze.

All the boys' noses wrinkled up when Sakura suddenly gave her sensei a short peck on the cheek. Only Hinata wanted to 'aaaw' at the sight, but she kept it to herself since it did not really look like the boys found the situation very cute. Hinata had never seen Iruka act like that before and she could not stop herself from blushing when her teacher flushed at Sakura's action. Everyone was very impressed with Sakura. None of them could ever have gone through with what she had and she sure had put on one hell of a show for them.

"I'm done," Shikamaru said and carefully climbed down from the tree to spare his back most possible. "I'm going back. I don't think that there's going to happen much more tonight."

"Me neither," Choji agreed and jumped down from his branch, soon followed by the rest of the group. Hinata said goodnight to the boys before they split up, them going back to their cabin and Hinata sneaking back into hers.

Everyone went to bed pretty quickly after returning to their own cabins. Shikamaru took note that Sasuke was already asleep, the events of earlier flashing before his eyes. Yuk, he was never going to kiss a boy ever again that was for sure.

Shikamaru then remembered the pill he had put into his night pants pocket and he pulled it out and looked at it for a minute. He then threw it into his mouth, snatched the glass of water from his nightstand and swallowed everything in one big mouthful. He was going to sleep amazingly that night, he was sure of it.

**oOo**

Iruka woke up slowly the next day, yawning before even orientating himself of his whereabouts. When he stretched, he suddenly felt something that was quietly sliding down from his lap and he quickly caught it. It was Sakura. The memories from the day before came back to him gradually. Had must have fallen asleep on the stool with Sakura. He never intended to do so, but he had just been so tired.

Sakura was still sleeping peacefully in his arms even though he had nearly dropped her. The girl had seemed so upset the day before, but Iruka hoped that he somehow had managed to make her forget what she was sad about so she could get the best out of the rest of the excursion anyway.

All of a sudden, someone cleared his throat and Iruka looked up at what was ahead of him for the first time. There stood Naruto, Shino, Kiba, Choji, Hinata and Ino, all with their arms crossed over their chests and all shooting him deadly glares that bore into his mind like daggers.

"G-Good m-morning," he stuttered and offered them a smile, but they purposely did not accept it. They wanted their teacher to suffer. He always ran them ragged both physically and mentally. Now that they had the chance to play a little around with their sensei, they had no intention of letting that chance slide by.

"Iruka-sensei, what are you doing with Sakura?" Naruto shouted steadfastly like his favorite sensei always did towards him whenever the blonde did something wrong.

Iruka looked at Ino and Hinata, suspecting that they had told the boys about him seeing Hinata almost naked. How was he going to get out of this mess? "I-I know that this m-might seem wrong, but this isn't what you think it is! And why are you guys even up already?"

"Save your breath, sensei. Let go of Sakura!" Naruto demanded and the others shouted, "Yeah," in unison. Iruka was not going to let them become the authority, he needed to keep his position as their respected teacher and not just become their supposedly perverted teacher. He would end up being looked at the same way as people looked at that copy ninja, Kakashi Hatake. Always indiscreetly reading those filthy books in public like he did not care about anything or anyone else than himself. Unlike him, Iruka demanded respect from his students.

The teacher got up on his feet, still holding onto Sakura as he too cleared his throat, looking down at his yellow haired student with a dead serious look in his eyes. "You will not speak to me in that tone ever again, understood, Naruto?" All of them looked up at him with furrowed brows that slowly went back into a normal position on their faces. They could not hold their laughter back any longer. Seeing their sensei all perplexed and mad like that on the same time was too funny and they all burst into a loud laughter.

Iruka felt like he was losing the battle at that very same moment. Why were they all suddenly laughing at him? What had he done? Iruka swore to himself that one day those kids were going to drive him insane. During his night with Sakura, he had seriously considered finding a woman that he could have some kids of his own with, but he was not so sure of that anymore. Not after this.

Sakura began to awaken because of the noise her fellow students were making. Slowly, she opened her eyes and looked around at all the students around her. She too did not understand what was so funny, but different from Iruka, she had an idea of what they were laughing about.

When they were done laughing, the girls left the room, including Sakura. Only the boys stayed back together with their sensei who was highly annoyed over the fact that no one wanted to fill him on anything. How much more did they have to make him suffer? Was not it enough that he had slept on a stool all night because of one of his students? The pain in his neck proved the effort he had put into making her happy. It should be enough.

"Iruka-sensei, we actually came here to ask for your help. We can't get Shikamaru to wake up. I think he's dead or something?" Naruto said, looking up at his beloved sensei.

"Nonsense, he's just trying to get out of having to do anything," he answered and followed them to cabin "4." He still could not figure out, though, how they managed to get up before him and how they even knew that he was in the girls' cabin?

When they entered Shikamaru and Sasuke's bedroom, Sasuke was not there and Shikamaru was still lying in his bed, sleeping.

"Time to get up, Shikamaru. You're the only one who's still sleeping." Shikamaru did not respond even the slightest to Iruka's remark, which irritated the short fused teacher. "There's no time for this, Shikamaru, get up, now!" he shouted loudly so he was sure to wake Shikamaru if he really was sleeping and not just pretending to do so. There still were not any response.

"I told you, I think he's dead!" Naruto repeated himself and started shuffling his feet.

"Quiet, Naruto. He's not dead, he's just lazy," Iruka said, though he was starting to grow a little concerned. With one hand, Iruka forced Shikamaru, who was lying with his back turned towards them, onto his back so he could face the pre-genin. The sight was not exactly worth remembering.

Shikamaru had a discontent look on his face and he had a huge amount of drool dripping from his cheek. Just looking at him was enough to scare the crap out of the other boys.

"For once, I'm going to agree with Naruto. I think he really is dead," Kiba said when looking at Shikamaru in disgust.

"Shut up and get out of here," Iruka snarled and grabbed Shikamaru by his shoulders and started roughly shaking the boy, his fragile head bouncing back and forth contrary to his body. "Shikamaru, you lazy bum, wake up already!" Still no response. The passivity from the boy almost killed Iruka who disliked being ignored exceedingly.

That was it. Iruka had officially had it with Shikamaru's lazy attitude and he could not stop himself from slapping the boy across his face with the back of his hand. This finally gave Iruka the response he desired so much, though it was not much – only a small grunt and a change of expression to the worse.

"Why the hell won't you wake up?" he yelled despairingly and let go of the student who almost hit his head on the wooden edge of the bed when falling back onto his pillow. "If you're not up and dressed when I come back, I will not hesitate to throw a bucket of water all over you!" Iruka screamed irascibly and stomped out of the room.

Shikamaru opened his eyes slowly, but his vision was blurry so he did not get what was going on around him. He murmured something that would be impossible for anyone to understand and lifted his hands to his face and rubbed his eyes while yawning aloud. When he removed his hands again and made another try at opening them, he was met by a familiar face that was too close to his own for him to feel comfortable with it.

"So, you're finally awake," Sasuke said and stepped away from Shikamaru who lay on the ground in the middle of the room. Sasuke had personally dragged him out of bed in an attempt to wake him and as always, he was successful at whatever he did.

Shikamaru smacked his lips lazily and tried to sit up, but the pain that suddenly shot through his entire body stopped him in his place. "Argh!" he growled and pushed his hips up, arching his back slightly in pain.

"What's going on?" Naruto shouted when barging into the room alongside with Choji and Iruka.

"Oh, I see you finally decided to join the living. Now get up and get dressed, I still won't hesitate to get that bucket, you know!" Iruka stated, but did not exit the room when Shikamaru moaned out loud.

"I-I can't! My back. It hurts!" he cried, placing both his hands under his back just by his loin.

"Stop complaining. Don't be such a baby and get up," Iruka walked over to him, still annoyed by the fact that he had refused to awaken earlier. He fastened upon Shikamaru's upper arms and lifted him to his feet, almost dropping him when hearing him scream in agony.

"Shikamaru?" Choji shouted concernedly and rushed to his friends side. Iruka finally understood that Shikamaru was serious about his back pain. He was not just playing around.

"Can you stand up straight?" Iruka asked apologetically and let Shikamaru put one hand on his bended arm for support. Shikamaru was stooping.

"I think Hinata screwed up my body completely with that massage!" Shikamaru kvetched and squeezed his eyes together tightly.

"No matter what's wrong with you, the pain is almost always worse when you have lied still for a longer amount of time. You should try to move around for a little, it might take some time for your muscles adjust," Iruka guided and held onto Shikamaru so he would not suddenly collapse. Shikamaru himself did not fear falling to the floor, though, he was more afraid that he would never take another step in his life. "Get out, boys, Shikamaru needs some space. Naruto, will you go to my cabin and get the painkillers in my bag?" Naruto nodded and grabbed Choji's wrist, dragging the other boy, who was fearing for his friend's health, with him. Shikamaru was thankful that Iruka had made them go since the situation was embarrassing enough already.

Sasuke went to the door, but glanced at Shikamaru one last time before walking out of there.

"The painkillers I've brought along are quite strong. If they don't ease the pain and you still feel like this later today, I will make sure to get a doctor out here to examine you."

"O-Okay," that was all Shikamaru managed to get over his lips.

"I'm not a chiropractic, but I know a few moves that should loosen your spine and loin at little. But since I won't really know what I'm doing, I might end up making it worse," Iruka said with a concerned tone in his voice. He really wanted to help the poor boy, but if he ended up doing more harm than good, then it was better for him to rely on the drugs even though Iruka would rather get around that.

"I'll go through anything to get rid of this pain!" Shikamaru cried, almost getting tears in his eyes from the sharp pain in his back.

Iruka still was not sure of it was such a good idea to let him practice his chiropractic skills on a already hurt student, but he did not see any way around it. Shikamaru could not possibly continue like this for much longer.

Shikamaru got down on his stomach with a lot of trouble and would never have managed to do so if Iruka had not been there to help him. Iruka then began his treatment. By the time Naruto and Choji returned, they found Shikamaru and Iruka in a very questionable position.

"I-Iruka-sensei?" Choji gasped when he saw Iruka sitting on the back of Shikamaru's thighs with bended knees, his groin pressing up against Shikamaru's ass. Iruka's hands were on the lowest part of Shikamaru's loin.

Naruto felt as if he was getting sick when Iruka started thrusting his hips back and forth in smooth motions, his groin rubbing against Shikamaru's ass like he was riding him. Naruto nearly dropped the bottle of painkillers when Shikamaru cried out loudly in pain.

Iruka knew what it must have looked like, but this time he did not really care. "Oh, grow up, will you? Shikamaru is in pain!" he snarled through his teeth. He was more than just tired of getting accused of being inappropriate with his students – even by his own students at that.

"We know, b-but could you at least have put some pants on?" Naruto pointed at Iruka, who looked down at himself and realized he was still only wearing his boxers and on top that, the belt around Iruka's waist had loosened so it was no longer keeping his robe in place, exposing his bare upper body and almost none covered genitals. He flushed, but glared up at the two boys nonetheless.

"Will one of you please get Hinata, I need her for something. And will you wait outside till we're done with this? I don't need you staring at me, it's embarrassing enough as it is!" Iruka snapped and the two boys nodded frighteningly at his menacing behavior, immediately turning on their heels to rush out of the room, but Iruka's angry voice made them pause. "Naruto!" Naruto looked himself over his shoulder anxiously. "Pills," he said simply in a low tone and Naruto realized that he had not dropped off the bottle yet.

"I-Iru...ka... sen-s-s, aah!" Shikmaru moaned, panting heavily.

"Oh, sorry about that, Shikamaru." Iruka had been so focused on the other two boys that he had completely forgotten what he was really doing and did not noticed that he had become too rough with the boy underneath him.

"I-It's-s ok-k-ay." His voice kept breaking and pausing like someone was dunking him in his back.

Naruto put the bottle on the floor before running after Choji who was already on his way to get Hinata, not wanting to watch Iruka and Shikamaru for another second.

Iruka placed his hands on each side of Shikamaru's spine with the lowest part of his palms pressed down against the boys skin, Iruka's fingers pointing upward. He then slid his hands down his back and Shikamaru muttered numerous curse words and clenched his fist in order to restrain himself from knocking Iruka off of him. Without any further notice, Iruka slid his hands all the way up to Shikamaru's shoulders, which he grabbed and jerked up until it was only the lower part of Shikamaru's belly that touched the floor. His entire spine snapped and he could not stop himself from shrieking with suffering.

"What are those two doing in there?" Sasuke asked pettishly.

"It sounds like Iruka-sensei is torturing him," Shino stated.

"No, it sounds like something else. If you know what I mean," Kiba laughed and winked at Shino, nudging him in the side with one elbow. Sasuke watched indifferently as it looked like they were about to get into fight. He then glanced at the door that was keeping Shikamaru's screams from entering the living room with full force. He started munching at his thumbnail.

When Shino noticed Sasuke's change of attitude, he broke the fight with Kiba, making him notice Sasuke as well. "What's with him?" the boy housing thousands of bugs asked.

"Hmm... I have no idea. I can never tell what's on that boy's mind." The two of them stared at the black haired boy for a moment before deciding that Shikamaru's screams were becoming too much for them and they walked outside instead, passing Naruto, Choji and Hinata just as they exited the cabin.

The three of them did not take time to exchange gazes with the two others, only rushed inside to meet up with Iruka and Shikamaru. When they entered, Iruka-sensei was back on his feet, adjusting his robe.

"Ah, Hinata, thank you for coming so quickly," Iruka said, tugging at both ends of his belt to secure it the best possible.

"W-Why did you want t-to see me, s-sensei?" she asked and looked down at Shikamaru who was lying on the floor like a stranded fish, gasping for air. If Naruto and Choji had not seen with their own eyes what the two of them had been doing, they would have probably thought that something entirely different had went down just before their entry.

"I don't know much about your Kekkei Genkai, but I do know that you are able to see things that I will never be able to see. Could you please check Shikamaru with you Byakugan and see if you can pin point what is wrong with him?" Hinata nodded towards Iruka before activating her special eyes.

After looking at Shikamaru for a short moment, she turned it off again and shook her head apologetically at her sensei. "His cha-chakra flow is s-stable and I-I didn't notice anything e-else that could b-be wrong," she stammered, sending Iruka a sad look with those big almost white eyes of hers.

"I see. Thank you for your help anyway, Hinata. And by the way, I think Shikamaru here might need another one of your massages later on. That is if you don't mind giving him one?" Iruka had fastened on what Shikamaru had said earlier.

Hinata's immediately broke into a highly visible blush. Iruka loved whenever she blushed the way she did at that moment. Those were the times where Hinata felt useful and genuinely happy. That smile she wore whenever she felt like that was heartwarming and it almost made Iruka's heart melt. He thought it was a shame that he only got to see it as rarely as he did. He had always endeavored to have blissful and confident students. It was hard for him to make her smile, unlike with his other students, and that was why he always tried to make her feel utile because he was a sure to get one of those smiles from her when she had been helpful to someone.

"I-If S-Shikamaru w-wants one, I-I'll only be g-glad to help h-him." Hinata bowed and sent her teacher a sweet and innocent smile. She appeared a little strange to Iruka that day. She had changed somehow or at least something about her had changed. He could not describe what was different about her from before, she just was.

"That's what I wanted to hear. Now, could you guys please gather everyone at the meeting place so we can get started with today's lesson?" The three pre-genin nodded eagerly and jumped out of the room after wishing Shikamaru a speedy recovery.

Iruka allowed Shikamaru to stay in his bed for the entire day. If he felt up for it later, he could come down to the lake where they would be practicing throwing shurikens. Shikamaru thanked Iruka for the rather rough treatment he had given him. It might have hurt during the session, but his back already felt a lot better. Iruka gave Shikamaru a few painkillers and told him to take one immediately, then one for lunch and finally one for dinner too if he was still feeling sore. Shikamaru nodded understandingly at his teacher that was suddenly handling him with a lot more care than he usually did. Iruka was usually always mad at Shikamaru because Shikamaru was lazy and Iruka could not tolerate people who had a bright mind, but did not bother to do anything about it. So it was nice to finally feel like something else than just a big nuisance to the teacher.

All the students followed Iruka to the lake once he had joined them at the meeting place. He noticed while walking down to the lake that Sakura, Ino and Hinata kept close to him all the way down there. He found it rather odd since those girls normally kept a good distance to him.

Iruka put everyone to work including the three girls that he was having a hard time with getting away from. They were practically playing a tug of war for his attention, all of them wanting him to watch them practice.

"Do you know what's going on with Sakura, Ino and Hinata? They've been acting strange around Iruka-sensei all day," Naruto asked Shino who seemed to be the smartest guy of cabin "4" when Shikamaru was not around.

"I heard one of them call Iruka-sensei _cute_. They've been all over him ever since last night. I bet it's one of those lame infatuations where the female student falls for her male teacher. I've heard about this at various occasions. Apparently it's normal for girls to fall in love with their teacher. They almost act the same as my bugs. They are willing to breed with anyone of the opposite gender. But as far as I know, humans are not supposed to think like that," Shino answered and Naruto could not help but feel stupid in the bug boy's presence. He had underestimated his knowledge. He might not have been as smart as Shikamaru, but since he had a whole other attitude than him, it almost made him appear like he was.

"Do you really think that's the case?" Shino nodded behind the tall collar of his shirt. Naruto looked towards Sakura who was tugging Iruka-sensei's arm, sending him a wide and playful smile.

"I don't get it, though. Why would they fall in love with their teacher? They should know that love like that can never truly blossom. And he's old." Shino shrugged confusedly and glanced at Naruto who was still looking at Sakura.

Naruto gritted his teeth when answering, "Maybe they just want him to acknowledge them," he sounded very serious, but he could not tear his eyes off of the enchanting sight of the pink haired girl. Naruto could not help but feel kind of jealous of Iruka-sensei, which only made him want to hit him. It killed him to admit it, but at that moment it was not Sasuke he was mad at. It was Iruka. The man who was stealing Sakura away from him. "I'll show him," Naruto mumbled.

"What?" Shino was puzzled and could not figure out what was going through the orange dressed boy's head.

"Nothing, just forget it," Naruto said, finally looking away from his newly gained rival. He grabbed a shuriken and threw it as hard as he could towards the tree with the target that was painted onto it. Shino was impressed. Naruto's shuriken had hit bulls eye. It was the first time he had even hit near the target.

Shikamaru sat up in his bed when Hinata entered his room around lunchtime. The dark haired girl smiled at him as she placed herself in front of his bed, handing him the tray of food Iruka-sensei had asked her to bring him once they had returned from their shuriken practice.

"Thank you, Hinata. Is this for me?" Shikarmaru asked and picked up the lonely pink flower that lay on the tray beside his food.

"Y-Yes. There w-were lots of t-them in the w-woods. I t-thought that maybe y-you would l-like it?" she stuttered nervously and the color on her cheeks suddenly matched the flower.

Shikamaru chuckled and stretched out one hand towards Hinata, making her flinch in surprise. That only made him smile and he placed the flower in her hair. "I think peonies fit you better than me. You compliment each other." Hinata blushed madly, becoming a darker shade of pink than the flower.

"Y-You think?" she asked, not believing the words Shikamaru had just spoken. She was not used to getting complimented like that. In fact, people rarely noticed her so she was surprised that Shikamaru, out of all people, had noticed something about her. Also, she had never imagined that the bright brunette would know anything about flowers. That boy sure was full of surprises.

He nodded, cocked his head a little to the side and kept on smiling at her. "If you're free tonight, then maybe you would consider taking me to the place where you found this," he said, poking the bashful flower in her hair.

"B-But what a-about your b-back?"

"I'm feeling a lot better already. Those pills Iruka-sensei gave me really kick... Uhm," Shikamaru paused. He needed to watch his language when being around Hinata. She stared at him expectantly, waiting for him to continue. "Well, they work better than I thought. Besides, I'm gonna go insane if I have to stay in here for an entire day. I need to get some fresh air."

"W-Well... A-alright t-then." They smiled at each other instead of shaking hands when sealing the deal.

Hinata then kept Shikamaru company as he ate the food she had brought him. It was kind of hard for him to eat in front of her since he wanted to look well-mannered, which he was not exactly very good at. At some point he even dropped a slice of tomato onto his quilt, but Hinata just giggled at it.

When he was finished, Hinata removed the tray from his bed. Both Shikamaru and her had went silent after planning what Shikamaru subconsciously hoped Hinata would think of as a date. He did not know what to say to her since they had not really spoken much together ever, which meant he did not know if they had anything in common or not that they could actually talk about. It then hit him.

"Hinata... I... Uhm... I'm feeling kind of stiff so if you have time would you, uh..." he did not understand why it was hard for him to ask her for a massage all of a sudden.

"Massage you?" she finished his sentence and nodded, "O-Of course."

The rest of the day went by relatively quickly, which Shikamaru did not understand because usually when you were bored or was looking forward to something, it always felt like you had to wait for an eternity to get to the point where you wanted to be.

By dinner time, Naruto had been the one to bring Shikamaru dinner. The blonde had showed him something that he had taken from Iruka-sensei's cabin when he had went to get Shikamaru those painkillers. It was a video camera.

"Why did you take it?" Shikamaru asked with an almost puzzled look on his face. He could not figure out why Naruto was telling him this.

"Because I thought we could use this camera to record you while you're sleeping. Isn't that obvious?" Naruto told Shikamaru.

"Not really, Naruto. But why would you wanna do that?"

"You keep having back problems and they become worse during night, right?"

"Yeah... What's your point?

"See, I wanna record you so we can find out if you're sleep walking or something!" Naruto said excitedly and patted himself mentally on the back for coming up with such a genius idea.

Shikamaru just rolled his eyes. "Do what you want, but I don't think I'm sleep walking or anything else like that. You're probably gonna get disappointed when watching it tomorrow."

"So it's okay? Cool!" Naruto took the video camera and placed it in a bookcase that stood in Shikamaru's room, hiding it with books and a cloth.

"Why the hell are you hiding it?" Shikamaru asked lazily and did not understand why Naruto cared to make such a big deal out of it. He was sure that nothing happened during night that could cause him this back pain he had. It was the hard mattress's fault. It had to be.

Naruto looked at Shikamaru with a raised brow. "Do you really think Sasuke is gonna let us do this? He's always such a buzz killer, I'm not even gonna bother asking him if he's okay with it or not. Besides, if he doesn't know it's there, then maybe we catch him doing something funny when he thinks no one is looking," the yellow haired boy snickered.

Shikamaru could not keep himself from smiling viciously at the thought. If they caught Sasuke doing anything stupid or embarrassing, it would be like winning the lottery. That boy could simply not be perfect. So if he never did not do anything wrong during daytime, then maybe he showed his true colors during night. It was a funny thought, but Shikamaru seriously doubted that they would get anything out of recording them. Also, he did feel a little uneasy over the fact that he was going to be recorded while sleeping. Naruto thought it could be funny if Sasuke did something while sleeping, but what if Shikamaru was the one who did something embarrassing like fart in his sleep or something? He could not tell the blonde that he was worried, though, it would just make him look like a chicken.

"Remember to turn it on before you go to bed. I don't wanna miss this and I'm not sure that I will be able to keep the camera for more than one night before Iruka-sensei notices that it's gone," Naruto tried to sound strict, but his tone did not scare Shikamaru. If he forgot to turn it on, so be it. It would not be such a big deal to him.

When Iruka had been to their cabin and said goodnight, Shikamaru had gone up again to change into some clothes. Sasuke had looked at him with a questioning look when he did this, but he had not asked anything so Shikamaru had not cared to clarify to him why he was putting on clothes when they were supposed to go to bed.

Shikamaru was ready to go after a little while, but unfortunately he ran into a little problem in the living room.

"Hey Shikamaru, where are you going?" _Oh Kami, not him. Now he probably wants to come along. What a drag,_ Shikamaru thought when Naruto had suddenly appeared and started asking questions about why Shikamaru was leaving in the middle of the night.

"Nowhere, I'm just going for a walk in the woods," he replied simply and crossed his fingers, hoping that Naruto would not find that very exciting.

"Really? I'm coming with you then! I can't sleep now anyway. Hey, we should ask the others if they wanna go too!" Naruto jumped up and down in his place before running into Choji and Shino's room, not noticing that Shikamaru was standing with a dissatisfied look on his face.

_Man, and I'm supposed to be the smart one? Now I have to wait for them. If I'm late, Hinata might not wanna go, _he thought and trudged back into his room, which Sasuke was just about to leave to go to the bathroom.

While Shikamaru was waiting, he might as well get everything ready so he could go straight to bed when he returned. He made his bed, folded his night pants and put them on the bed and got a glass of water and a painkiller, placing both things on his nightstand. He had not taken his evening pill yet since he had not seen any reason for it. His back had felt better and better as the day had progressed. First of all, Iruka-sensei had giving him that spine cracking treatment, which helped even though Shikamaru doubted that it would do him any good when Iruka had first started. Then he had gotten the painkillers and later Hinata had given him a massage. Plus Iruka had not forced him to carry anything heavy or something like that the entire day so his back had gotten all the rest it needed to recover properly. Now all he needed was to stretch his muscles by taking a walk, which he sure did not mind doing when Hinata was going to keep him company.

He was sure that tomorrow was the day where he would finally wake up without a sore back.

Naruto returned after a while and he had Shino and Kiba with him.

"Where's Choji?" Shikamaru asked. "And doesn't Sasuke wanna go too?"

Naruto shook his head and shrugged his shoulders. "Sasuke is tired and Choji doesn't feel well. I think he ate too much again."

"Choji," Shikamaru mumbled under his breath resignedly. That boy just did not know when to stop eating. It was like he had this huge hole in his stomach that could not be filled out. It did not bother Shikamaru that much at the time, though. The fewer people the better.

The boys had then left the cabin to go to the woods, though Naruto had went to Shikamaru's room before going to make the video camera start recording. He knew that Shikamaru was not going to remember it once they got back or else he just would not care to turn it on.

After leaving the cabin, it did not take long for Naruto to notice something. Was not they supposed to go the other way? Where was Shikamaru headed? The blonde kindly reminded the brunette that the woods they were going to was in the opposite direction. To that Shikamaru just answered that they might as well all go now that most of them were going already. Naruto of course did not mind having the girls tag along and went willingly with Shikamaru. Shino did not seem to care whether or not the girls joined, but Kiba, on the other hand, seemed more excited about it than all the boys combined. Shikamaru was not the kind of guy to wear his feelings on his sleeve and preferred to keep his excitement hidden from the others. All he ever showed was how much of a drag he thought certain things were. Well... most things, actually.

Hinata was surprised to see that Shikamaru had brought most of the other boys with him, but tried to act calm and not lose her composure. She asked if the other girls wanted to come along too and they thought it sounded nice so they were in immediately.

On their way down to their destination, Shikamaru purposely walked slower than all the others and was happy that Hinata got the hint that he wanted to be alone with her.

"Sorry about this. Naruto did not exactly give me the choice to leave without him," Shikamaru murmured in a low voice so the people walking in front of them would not hear.

"I-It's okay, S-Shikamaru. I-I don't mind at a-all." Hinata sent him a small smile and he could feel himself blushing slightly when receiving that innocent gesture from her.

Shikamaru told the others to take him to the part of the woods they had been training in so Hinata would not have to speak up in front of everybody. She was grateful for that. When they arrived, everyone immediately dropped some of their clothes and jumped into the lake. Except for Shikamaru and Hinata, that is. Hinata was too shy to take any of her clothes off in front of the others and Shikamaru would rather stay and get some alone time with her than go swimming, even though he figured it might have benefited his back.

The setting was really beautiful. This part of the woods was filled with blossoming flowers. Including the kind of flower Hinata had brought Shikamaru. He laughed to himself when he remembered receiving the peony from her. He could not possibly be less of a gentleman than he was. _He_ had gotten a flower from _her_, not the other way around. He really should learn how to take the initiative more often. Especially when it came to girls, at least if he did not want to end up as a lonely old man with no wife or children.

He laid down on the ground and looked up at the moon. "I like the sky tonight. It's very... soothing. If you get what I'm saying," he said to Hinata who laid down beside him after a short while. She looked up at the sky as well.

"Y-Yeah. I-I think I understand w-what you mean," she stuttered lightly and closed her eyes after looking at the sky in silence with Shikamaru for several minutes. She just lay there, listening to her friends' laughter as they splashed around in the water.

Shikamaru gulped when looking at her content figure. Was this his chance? Was now the time for him to take the initiative? Slowly, he let the hand closest to Hinata slide over the dirty woodland floor. He bit his lip and looked down at his hand that was getting closer to hers, noticing that his hand was trembling from the adrenaline that ran through his terrified body. He had never done anything like this before.

He looked up at her face again to see her reaction when one of his fingers barely brushed against her hand. Her body gave a little twitch, but that was all and he figured it was safe to move on. He was so afraid of rejection that he considered leaving her hand alone for a moment, but then he pulled himself together and thought, _it's now or never, Shikamaru. Just do it._

A lump began to form in his throat and he was suspecting that the suspense would soon make him soak himself in sweat.

Carefully he moved closer and Hinata seemed to notice the sound of him moving around, but her eyes remained closed. In an even slower pace than before, his hand started moving again, bumping into hers as the back of their palms connected. Shikamaru wished that she would not open her eyes while he was still trying to make himself continue so the innocence in her eyes would not make it even harder for him to move on. But he was unfortunate, because suddenly her eyes shot open and she turned her head to look at Shikamaru. Her eyes filled with terror.

Shikamaru swallow loudly. He was close enough to her to smell that she was wearing a perfume, the smell resembling the scent of a peony. His heart started beating faster and faster, his eyes stung because he forgot to blink and he did not even notice that he was holding his breath.

One last move from him. That was all it was going to take.

_Shikamaru, what are you waiting for? Why do you have to be so damn passive! _Shikamaru was not just lazy because he did not care about a lot of things. He was also lazy because of situations like these. He might not seem like it to most people, but he was a shy guy. Very shy. That was why he had created this image of being lazy. It got him out of a lot of situations that he could not go through without going mental.

Hinata seemed to have completely frozen up, but he did not know if that was a good sign or not. She was even more shy than him so he should not expect anything less from her than complete and utter freeze-up.

He took a deep breath even though he knew that Hinata would be able to read his insecurity from it and slowly placed his hand on top of hers. It felt numb, almost like she was dead, and it was a little cold too. It looked like she wanted to say something, but she could not.

He let his hand slide into her palm so their hands fitted each other, carefully interlacing their fingers.

She opened her mouth slightly and started in- and exhaling heavily. Almost like she was panting in fear. Was she hyperventilating? Shikamaru figured that she was probably just nervous.

He planned out in his head how to approach her. There were so many ways of dealing with it and he had to choose the one that would not give her a heart attack. It was hard and he had no experience in this area that he could draw on. He could not do much else than just go with the flow.

They could still hear the others that were down by the lake. As long as they stayed where they were, Shikamaru did not expect any annoying interruptions to occur. He especially listened to where Naruto was. He was the last person he wanted to see them.

He glanced down at the lake. He was right, everyone was still swimming. Then suddenly, he heard an unsure stutter coming from right beside him. "S-Shika... m-maru?" he looked back at Hinata who did not seem like she was even aware that she had said his name. She was still frozen up in her place.

Shikamaru did now know if he should answer or not and chose not to say anything since it did not look like she expected a response and to be honest with himself, he had no idea of what to say to her. At that moment his body was running on pure instinct. All he wanted was to feel her lips against his. His actions would speak for him.

He rolled to the side, supporting himself with the arm closest to Hinata, but he did without letting go of her hand. She looked up at him with those big eye of hers, not knowing what to expect of him next.

_Here it goes, _Shikamaru thought to himself and slowly began to lean closer to her. Their lips brushed and he wanted to smile at just the slightest touch he had gotten, but when he leaned closer to get more, she rolled her head away from him, placing only the tips of her fingers on her lips to prevent him from trying again.

"I... I-I'm s-s-sorry," she stammered heavily, avoiding Shikamaru's disappointed gaze. He breathed out a sigh of regret, leaning away from her, scooting a little away from her too, lying down on his back and finally letting go of her hand.

"It's Naruto... Isn't it?" Shikamaru whispered, looking up at the sky, trying to somehow find comfort in it.

"I-I'm s-sorry," she repeated and he understood that it was indeed her feelings for Naruto that prevented her from feeling anything besides from friendship for Shikamaru. The fact that she blushed madly at the mention of the blonde's name gave her away.

He closed his eyes, mentally giving himself the worst beating he could imagine. How could he be so stupid? Of course Hinata did not like him in that way. How could he even think that for one second? Had not he learned to read the situation and people's emotions? Was he becoming as big an ignoramus as Naruto?

He knew he should not be mad at Naruto. You cannot decide who you fall in love with. Hinata was just unfortunate when picking Naruto as her one. He was head over heels for Sakura and none of them noticed the affection they had for one another. That was probably the worst part. Maybe he would not be so jealous of Naruto if he would just realize what was standing right in front of him and then give up on Sakura because everyone could see that that was never going to happen. Shikamaru did not regret letting himself have feelings for the almost white eyed girl. His only regret was that he had let his feelings take over his sanity in the end.

"Shi... S-Shikamaru, I-I," the girl he had been rejected by whispered, but he cut her off.

"You don't have to explain yourself. It's okay. I understand." Shikamaru was more than just disappointed, but there was nothing he could do about it. It was not like he was in love with her or anything, she was more like a crush. He was just embarrassed over himself for breaking the only rule he had set for himself. And for what? Just to be rejected.

**oOooOooOo**

**That might just have been my longest chapter I have ever written! Holy shit xD  
It's been three days since the last update and as promised, here's the third one^^!  
I hope that everyone is enjoying the story so far. The next update will be on Tuesday...**

**There will be 2-3 chapters more until we reach the end of this.**

**If any of you are reading my other story "Anything Else?," I wanna apologize for not updating it yet! I'll get to it soon, I've already started writing on the next chapter so I promise it'll be published soon – I also promise to put in some treats ;D **

**See ya' :D!**


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

Everyone in cabin "4" was aroused with a jerk when their fellow roommate, Kiba, suddenly guffawed. No one appreciated being aroused like that and most of them just pulled their quilts over their heads and tried to fall asleep again even though they should probably just have gotten out of bed now that they were awake anyway. They would be sure to score some points with their teacher if they were up and ready before Iruka even got the chance to get to their cabin, but Kiba's annoying awakening had only made them stubborn.

"Hahaha!" Kiba laughed uproariously, pointing at Naruto who was changing his pants, his face turning tomato red.

Shino walked in, he was curious to see what had made Kiba laugh like that even though he already had a pretty good idea of why he was laughing. After all, he knew what the boy had done to the sleeping Naruto the night before.

"Look Shino," Kiba said immediately when his friend appeared in the doorway, "Naruto hasn't learned how to hold his water yet!" Naruto hang his head in shame and tried to avoid having to look at his classmates. Shino did not laugh, he just watched the other two silently.

"Could you please not shout it all over the place," Naruto muttered and began to change the sheets, feeling incredibly uncomfortable with the whole situation. He had not wet his bed for years, not since he was little, so why did he have to do it now of all times?

"Phew, it stinks! Maybe I should get Sakura for you. She might know how to get rid of that awful smell. She is a girl, after all!" Kiba teased and walked closer to Naruto, laying a hand on the embarrassed boy's shoulder. Naruto brushed his hand away and snarled at Kiba without looking up at him. Kiba just smiled. "Am I supposed to be afraid of someone who wets himself?"

Iruka-sensei was on his way to cabin "4" when he noticed the loud riot coming from the boys' cabin. It sounded like Kiba. The teacher was afraid that he was after Naruto again and picked up his pace.

Kiba kept teasing Naruto and pushed him down onto the soggy mattress. Naruto managed to prevent himself from falling completely down on the bed by placing his hands on the bed, breaking the fall.

"You're such a baby, Naruto! Didn't your parents teach you anything?" Kiba growled viciously. Shino was surprised that Kiba dared to bring up Naruto's non-existing parents and thought that his friend might have crossed the line this time. Like it was not enough already that he had let Naruto sleep with one hand in a bowl of water throughout the entire night. Kiba had claimed that it was just an experiment to see if you really did wet your bed if you slept like that, but apparently he did not bother to tell Naruto about the experiment when it turned out it actually worked and now Naruto thought that he really had wet his bed without a reason. Kiba sure could be unpleasant.

That was the last straw that broke the camel's back. Naruto turned around, shoved Kiba by his shoulders and glared at him with tears in his eyes. He clenched his fists and pouted, trying his best to keep the tears from falling. The reaction Naruto gave him took Kiba by surprise and he could not stop himself from saying the first thing that came to his mind.

"What... Are you gonna cry now too?" he made it sound a little more careless than he had intended it too, but he could not change what he had already said.

"What's going on in here?" Iruka asked when stepping inside the room, laying eyes on the feuding boys and Shino who did not seem to want to get involved in whatever was going on.

Kiba and Shino both turned to look at their sensei. Naruto was too ashamed to do so and instead he pushed Kiba out of the way, ran past Iruka and fled out the cabin within a few seconds, leaving the three others looking after him as he made his escape.

When Iruka had put two and two together, he turned his attention towards Kiba who gulped when seeing the furious look on his teacher's face. He backed when Iruka took a step forward and asked Shino to leave the room immediately. Shino did not want to get in his sensei's way and ran out the room, almost getting hit by the door as Iruka slammed it close behind him.

"What's all the ruckus for?" Choji asked, walking up beside Shino who stood in the living room right in front of the door leading to Naruto and Kiba's room. Shino did not answer. Just listened as Iruka started yelling louder than they had ever heard him yell before.

Sasuke joined them a moment later and even Shikamaru had dragged himself out of bed to find out what was going on in the room outside their own.

Iruka grabbed Kiba by his collar and lifted him till his feet did not touch the ground anymore and slammed the young boy's back against the wall. Kiba had never seen Iruka look so mad before.

"What did you do to him?" Iruka shouted right into Kiba's face, the boy flinching in fear. He had had it with this boy.

"I-I didn't d-do a-anything," Kiba whispered with a stutter worse than Hinata's. Akamaru began to bark at Iruka, obviously trying to help his friend get away from the threatening older man.

None of them came out of the room for nearly three minutes and the four pre-genin that stood outside the room all swore that they heard the clapping sound of skin connecting with skin before the door flung open and Iruka stomped determinedly towards the door with his eyes looking straight ahead. He did not deign either of the students one single look before walking out of the cabin.

Everyone turned their heads, with jaws dropped, to look into the room where Kiba stood with a remarkable red hand on his cheek and tears in his eyes. They all jumped back when Kiba walked angrily over to the door and pushed his way past his classmates. The brown haired boy went to the bathroom, slammed the door shut and locked it, Akamaru only just managing to get inside the bathroom before this happened. Kiba just wanted to be alone.

Iruka searched everywhere for Naruto within the camp, but he was nowhere to be seen. It was not until he started looking for him in the woods that he finally found the boy. He was sitting with his back resting up against a tree and his knees pressed against his chest with his arms on top of them. His face was hidden behind his arms.

When Iruka walked closer, he was able to hear that the boy was crying. A sad look found its way to Iruka's face and he wondered for a minute if he should just leave the boy alone. But in the end, he could not get himself to leave and he approached the boy.

The teacher slowly put a hand on the yellow haired boy's shoulder, but Naruto shook it off, still not wanting too look up from his arms.

"Naruto," he said in a low voice, but Naruto did not react to it, just kept on crying. Iruka sighed and sat down beside his student. He could not see any way around it. "You know, I used to have accidents like that too when I was around your age," Iruka admitted and pressed his back against the tree, looking up at the clear morning sky.

Naruto sobbed twice and sniffled, gradually muffling down his cries to listen to what Iruka had to say.

"They say it's sometimes due to an inner conflict, like if you are sad about something. I mean, that's when accidents like these might happen. I started doing it after my parents died. It was really embarrassing and I was made fun of too." Naruto raised his head a little so he could glance up at his sensei. He never imagined that something like that had ever happened to Iruka. He was too cool to wet his bed.

The boy sniffled hard before whispering with a husky voice, "Ho... H-how did y-you make it s-stop?"

"Stop? Naruto, I'm still doing it even today," he sounded dead serious. Naruto's head finally bounced up and he stared at his teacher with big, glossy eyes. Iruka-sensei was a grown man and he still wet his bed? Naruto could not believe it. A small smile slowly started to form on Iruka's lips and he chuckled lightly. "I'm just kidding."

Naruto could not take his eyes off Iruka. He stared at him intensely, not blinking as much as he should. Iruka looked down at Naruto before closing his eyes and sending him a real smile. Had Iruka-sensei just told a joke? Who would have thought that Iruka Umino, the hot-headed and always serious academy teacher, was able to be funny?

The boy chuckled along with Iruka who was happy to see that his student was finally able to smile again. A wide smile like that fit his round, childish face much better than that sad look he sometimes wore.

Iruka placed his hand on top of Naruto's head and ruffled his hair. "You'll get over it as soon as you get over whatever conflict you might have. And don't mind Kiba, he's just trying to cover his own insecurity." Naruto shot his teacher a questioning look. Just what did he mean by that? Iruka nodded. "Yes, Naruto, Kiba wets his bed too sometimes. After all, we're only human."

Naruto did not know from where Iruka had gotten that kind of information, but he had to admit that it was really comforting to hear that. It was also nice to just sit there with his favorite teacher. Maybe he had not forgotten about Naruto completely? Lately it had felt like Iruka only had time for his female students and yet he was there with Naruto, comforting him and telling him personal details about himself and his childhood.

"Come, let's head back. And don't worry about your mattress, I'll figure out what to do with it." Naruto nodded and wiped the remaining tears away with the sleeve of his pajamas. He could just barely remember now why he had been mad at Iruka.

Iruka got up on his feet, offering Naruto his hand. Naruto of course took it and was dragged up onto his feet. The brunette patted the boy's shoulder quickly before turning on his heels to return to the camp, but he was stopped in his place when suddenly Naruto wrapped his arms around him, pressing Iruka's back up against his face. Iruka was flabbergasted to say the least.

"Thank you, Iruka-sensei!" he shouted, letting a few sobs escape from his lips that was still curled up into a genuinely happy smile.

Iruka was unable to hide a fatherly grin that climbed his face when looking down at the boy that was clinging to him like his life depended on it. His knees sunk down a little and he stooped lightly so he was able to put an arm around Naruto's shoulder. Naruto had had many golden moments with his teacher, but this had to be his most precious one so far.

When Naruto and Iruka returned to the camp together, Ino, Sakura and Hinata exited their cabin at that very same moment. They immediately spotted Iruka, their eyes turning into glittering stars of admiration.

"Good morning, Iruka-sensei!" Sakura shouted and waved at her teacher.

"Iruka-sensei, would you please come and watch me practice with my shurikens?" Ino yelled excitedly, jumping up and down in her place.

"M-Maybe you c-could watch me t-too?" Hinata said shyly and brought one insecure finger to her lips.

"Sure girls, I'll be with you in a minute!" Iruka shouted back, waving at the girls who were all close to fainting at the sight of his wide smile.

Naruto looked from the girls to his sensei, slowly putting on a small pout. Reality had just struck him like a lightning. He was not mad at Iruka for making Sakura forget that the yellow haired boy even existed. He was mad at him for spending more time with his fan base than with Naruto.

Iruka was still waving at the girls when suddenly he felt a small, warm hand sneaking its way into his. He looked down at Naruto in surprise as he jerked the teacher along with him. "Iruka-sensei, I want to show you how good I've become at hitting bulls-eye!" Naruto shouted blithely, dragging his teacher back towards the woods while looking back at the girls, sticking his tongue out at them. He was not going to give up Iruka-sensei now that he had finally begun to give him some attention again.

"Uh-Uhm. Okay, Naruto?" Iruka looked back the three girls who were glaring at Naruto and shouting death threats his way, the teacher still being ignorant to what was actually going on. "I'm sorry girls, I'll come watch you later!" He had never been this sought after and he wondered what had changed all of the sudden. It was actually rather enjoyable to be this popular with his students.

Shikamaru, Sasuke, Choji and Shino sat around the table in their cabin, all busy with eating breakfast. Kiba did not care to join them, he was still locked inside the bathroom, sulking over the earlier events of the morning. It did not seem to affect Shino that he was not there though.

Shikamaru's back had begun to hurt badly again. He had taken the pill he had leftover from the day before, but the pill had not taken effect yet and Shikamaru thought that the pain was going to kill him slowly, even though it was not as bad as it had been some of the days before. He dreaded this morning soreness.

He moaned and placed one hand on his back, leaning over the table and making a grimace at the pain.

"Shikamaru, are you alright?" asked Choji and looked at him with eyes filled with concern.

"Sure, it's just my back again," he said and sent Choji a small smile, trying to make it sound like it was not such a big deal.

Shino got up from his seat and walked over to the sink with his dirty plate to start cleaning the dishes that still stood there from the day before. No one ever cared to help him, he was the only one who seemed to be bothered by the mess on the kitchen table.

Shikamaru moaned again when he tried to sit up straight and he bit down hard on his lip, trying to prevent himself from complaining any further. He knew everyone was getting pretty tired of him and his sore back and most had started to think that he was not really in that much pain. He was probably just exaggerating it to get out of having to clean the cabin in the evening and all the other things that Iruka demanded of them. Shikamaru was not trying to get people to feel sorry for him, though, he was actually doing the opposite, trying desperately not to make it sound like anything was wrong with him at all.

Suddenly Sasuke sighed loudly, closing his eyes in an irritably manner and said, "Why don't you just ask Hinata for a massage already? You always feel better afterward, don't you?"

Shikamaru glanced at Sasuke in surprise. Since when did that Uchiha kid start noticing anything that Shikamaru did? Yeah, he was right, though, he did feel better whenever he had gotten a massage from her or after Iruka had performed that torturous art of massage on him. But Iruka had gone off to find Naruto, presumably, and he was not in a particularly good mood that morning so the brunette figured that he should not bother to ask his teacher for help. That meant he had to ask Hinata if he wanted any kind of help with his back, but that was not going to happen. His back was practically screaming for him to get over himself and just go ask her, but he could not even get himself to think that that was actually an option. Actually, he wanted to avoid her at all costs. He would rather sail in his own sea of self-pity than have to face her. It would be too embarrassing.

"Nah, I'm good," Shikamaru replied and took a mouthful of his cornflakes and for the second time that morning, the boys got a glimpse of the unsatisfied Kiba. He came out of the bathroom, puffy, red eyes and Akamaru on his tail. He looked furious.

"What have you been doing?" Shino asked as Kiba walked past him, not bothering to stop and chat with his friend.

"I was taking a dump," he murmured just before walking into his room, closing the door after himself. It was obvious to everyone that he was lying, though. Nearly so obvious that it was hilarious. He had hid in the bathroom because he was crying; even the biggest idiot would be able to see that.

It was not until everyone had went silent again and Shikamaru was about to leave the table that he unwillingly started to complain.

"Kami, do you want me to do it or what? I can't stand listening to your moaning anymore!" Sasuke shouted, earning himself shocked stares from every single person in the room. Had Sasuke Uchiha just offered Shikamaru a freaking massage? Yes, he had indeed. Sasuke was tired of Shikamaru's constant wailing. They were roommates so it was him who had to listen to it in the morning, before they went to bed and throughout the entire night. He would do about anything to make him stop complaining.

Shikamaru looked around at the others who were looking from Sasuke to him, impatiently waiting for an answer. He really did not even want to consider saying yes, but his back hurt a great deal. And would it really be that wrong of him to say yes? It was just a friendly massage after all. If he was going to say yes, he should at least pretend to be confident about it.

"Uhm... Sure?" he tried to act cool, but he was not sure if the others fell for it. He had too put his pride aside just to get the accepting word over his lips. He was not exactly thrilled about this, but he too knew that he would not be able to do much for the entire day if he did not get someone to loosen him up. Besides, he would have said yes if it was Choji who had asked him. It would still be weird, but not nearly as much as when it was Sasuke who was asking him. If he could survive having his own teacher dry hump him, he would survive this too. Compared to that, this was actually not such a big deal.

"Good, then go get yourself ready," the black haired boy demanded carelessly, not even bothering to look at the stunned boys around him.

Shikamaru tried not to put too much into it and pretended like it was not Sasuke who was going to give him that massage. He dropped off his dirty plate in the sink and went to his room. Shino got the brunette's hint; he was not going to clean that up himself.

Sasuke finished his own breakfast and did the same as Shikamaru, though, he found a small bowl and filled it with water before following the brunette to the bedroom. The two boys that was left to themselves in the living room stood staring after them for a few seconds, not believing what had just happened. This was not like Sasuke. So far, this morning had been interesting indeed.

Shino sent Choji a shrug when the other boy look at him questioningly. Choji looked down at the dishes that Shino was in the middle of cleaning and Shino was happy that someone was finally noticing what he was doing and was willing to help - or so he thought because Choji just sent him a smile before trudging off to the bathroom. Shino sighed loudly, just when he thought that Choji was good for something else than eating people's leftovers.

Shikamaru had placed himself on the edge of his bed and was about to lie down on his stomach when Sasuke shuffled inside the room.

"Shirt," he said flatly, making Shikamaru look down at himself. So Sasuke wanted him to take his shirt off? He had actually kept it on because he thought that the Uchiha would rather not touch his bare skin, but he apparently he was completely wrong about that.

He looked at Sasuke for a few seconds, the other boy just stood looking down at him, waiting for him to take off that tasteless fishnet shirt of his. Shikamaru then finally did as he was told and he laid down on his stomach afterward, crossing his arms under his head on his pillow and resting his head on top of them, watching as Sasuke wet his hands with the water from the bowl.

The ladies man slowly began with massaging Shikamaru's shoulders, mainly using his circulating thumbs to loosen the other boys muscles. Shikamaru grunted quietly and wrinkled up his nose. This definitely was not a very comfortable position he had gotten himself into, but he had to admit that Sasuke's rough touch worked even better than Hinata's gently one.

The black haired boy then worked his way down Shikamaru, using his palms to spread water from his newly moisturized hands all over the brunette's back. Water definitely was not as good as oil for this kind of job, but Sasuke did not have any at hand and he assumed none of the others kept that kind of products so naturally he would have to settle with the quickly vaporizing water.

When going down Shikamaru's back, he kept his hands flat and closer to the boy's ribs than his spine, unlike when he was going up his back where he only used his thumbs to go in ever widening circles on the skin just beside his spine. Shikamaru moaned loudly when Sasuke pressed down on a unbelievably sore spot in his loin and he immediately stopped and pressed his thumb down on that spot. At first it hurt a lot on Shikamaru when his body tightened around that spot, but when Sasuke finally let go, his whole body felt kind of relieved and the spot was not sore the same way as it was before. It was almost like he could feel that the muscles around it began to relax.

"You're good at this," Shikamaru groaned and finally decided to close his eyes and enjoy the massage instead of tensing his body up even further. That would only make Sasuke's work a lot harder to finish properly.

"Quiet," Sasuke said simply and got down on his knees, leaning his upper body over the edge of the bed so he could reach Shikamaru's back with his elbow. A cold shiver ran down the brunette's spine when a strand of Sasuke's soft hair trailed over his back, tenderly tickling his sensitive skin.

Shikamaru wanted to moan out loud, but he held it back, knowing that the sensation Sasuke had caused him was not a sensation that he was allowed to act on. He was disgusted by himself when a certain part of his body started tickling. He wished that it was Hinata who was doing this to him, but since that was never going to happen, he would settle with imagining that it was her and not Sasuke.

The elbow pressed hard down his back and traveled up and down it on both sides of his spine. A breath of hot air slightly danced over the surface of his skin, madly teasing him until it gave him goosebumps all over his body, the short hairs on his arms slowly beginning to stand up on their own.

Shikamaru gasped and furrowed his brows when he felt the elbow shifted back to being hands that brushed over his back and all the way down to the edge of his pants. His heart started pounding faster against his chest and he could not stop himself from carefully biting his lower lip. If he kept his eyes closed like this, he suspected that he would soon drift off into a half awake and half asleep state of mind, which would only make the experience feel so much better. But he could not let his imagination take over completely. He had to keep reminding himself that this was in fact Sasuke and not Hinata who was touching him.

The brunette cringed with embarrassment when ten fingers slipped under his pants and underwear, only just stopping before reaching his softer area down there. Sasuke pressed the tips of his fingers down into Shikamaru's skin and let them slide down to his side, then up again to the starting point and then down again, loosening every tight muscle in his loin.

"Mmm..." Shikamaru moaned quietly, "Hi... na... targh!" His mind immediately returned to the present moment when Sasuke scratched him with one nail as he withdraw his fingers from under Shikamaru's pants.

"Whoops, sorry," Sasuke said indifferently and got back up on his feet.

"I think I'm good now," Shikamaru hissed irritably and was just about to sit up when he felt something strange in his lower region, instantly laying back down on his stomach. He closed his eyes in shame and cursed himself for getting so lost in the moment.

"You want me to continue?" Sasuke asked, looking down at the obviously uncomfortable brunette.

"No," he replied quickly, "I just wanna lie here for a moment. Thanks." Sasuke blinked a few times, trying to figure out why Shikamaru was acting so strangely all of a sudden.

The boy with the black hair shrugged his shoulders. "Fine. I'll see you later," that was the last thing he said before grabbing the bowl and walking out of the room.

Shikamaru breathed out a sigh of relief. He hoped that Sasuke had not caught onto his little problem while still being in the room. He felt so embarrassed about himself and the heat had turned his cheeks red long before Sasuke had gone.

"What a drag," he whispered into his pillow and wondered for how long he would have to lie there without doing anything before the result of his fantasies would disappear on its own.

Iruka had arranged for his students to play a game of capture the flag that day. The point of the game was for the them to understand the importance of a silent approach and if you could complete your mission without your enemy even being aware of what had happened. Of course, becoming more aware of teamwork was also a part of the task. Everyone enjoyed playing the game very much and Iruka thought that his alternative way of teaching had turned out to be a success and he even considered beginning to do stuff like that on normal school days. Maybe that would get the students more motivated.

It was a truly satisfied teacher that walked backed from the woods that afternoon with a line of kids behind him. Kiba was walking in the back with Shino, Sakura, Ino and Hinata. He was still mad at Iruka for hitting him.

"Hey girls," Kiba whispered loudly enough for the yellow haired boy, who walked just in front of them, to hear. "Guess what Naruto did this morning," he continued and Naruto could not possibly avoid hearing the giggles that soon came from Sakura and Ino. Iruka-sensei had made the Kyuubi kid feel a lot better about himself after having that talk with him in the woods, but he was still embarrassed and now that the girls knew, it did not make it any easier on him.

He hung his head as he walked on, trying to shut out the conversation revolving him.

When they had all safely returned to the camp, Iruka reminded the people who had kitchen duty that they needed to come earlier to prepare the food they were having. It was Naruto and Shikamaru's turn along with one other boy and girl. Shikamaru had hoped that he could have avoided having to do kitchen duty, but Iruka was not going to let him off that easily just because he had had some minor problems with his back.

None of them really spoke during the preparation of the food and it was mainly because there just was not time for it. Iruka worked them all really hard and it was not until they were done with the most important parts of the meal that they were allowed to take a break.

Shikamaru pulled off his jacket and shirt and threw himself on the ground. The scent that reached his nostrils when hitting the tall, green grass was the smell of summer and nature. Shikamaru placed his hands behind his head and looked up at the passing clouds in the sky. This was something he had definitely missed doing when being on the excursion. He did not know why, but for some reason he just had not been able to find time to lay down and relax like he did at that moment.

The brunette closed his eyes, took in the wonderful smell of the uncut grass and exhaled loudly with a small smile playing on his lips. The smile faded, though, when a blonde kid placed himself next to Shikamaru, he too lying down on his back.

Shikamaru opened one eye and gazed at the boy who had a sad look on his face. He really did not want to ask what was wrong. All he had wished to do was lie on his back and have a nice quiet moment with himself, but that of course would not be possible with someone like Naruto around.

His eyes glided towards a group of girls who were talking and snickering viciously. Shikamaru noticed that they were the victims of Naruto's attention too. The blonde seemed even sadder after spotting a certain pink haired girl who just happened to be one of the giggling girls. That was when Shikamaru noticed Hinata. She was sitting on a stub by the fireplace, cautiously chatting with her roommate.

"What's with the long face?" Naruto asked in a low tone that did not sound all that sincere to Shikamaru. All the things that were going through the orange dressed boy's mind were bothering him too much to actually put an effort into what he was asking.

Shikamaru had not noticed his own sudden change of expression when laying eyes on Hinata. He had been almost content before seeing her, but now he was reminded of all the events of last night.

Naruto was not even looking at the brunette anymore when Shikamaru's attention had turned to the blonde, but he had gotten up into a sitting position, staring at Sakura from a distance.

"Nothing, just chilling," Shikamaru said flatly and tried not to be too obvious about his hurt feelings. "What about you?" If he could get the blonde talking, then maybe he would not focus on him and so he could get around talking about a subject he really did not feel comfortable with talking about.

"Oh... Nothing," Naruto replied with an almost jittery voice. Shikamaru could easily tell that the yellow haired boy did not want to talk about his problems either and therefore he directed his gaze towards the sky again, not adding anything to Naruto's short and false statement.

Both boys were looking at the sky for several minutes without feeling the need to speak to each other. The silence was more comforting than anything at that moment. None of them knew what was on the other's mind or what could possibly have caused that frustrated look on their faces. The silence between them spoke for itself. Whatever problem they might have had, it was something that they would have to get past on their own.

Even if Naruto was not in the best mood, he still could not stand being quiet for too long and when he could not handle it anymore, he looked down at Shikamaru with a smile that meant to cover the loneliness he felt inside, his eyes were telling a different story.

"Hey, Shikamaru, I had almost forgotten about the video camera. Wanna go check if we caught anything interesting on tape?" Shikamaru looked up at Naruto, being slightly dissatisfied with the boy breaking the beautiful silence and the sleep he had almost drifted into.

He did not really care what was on that tape since he did not expect them to discover anything intriguing or something like that. But now that Naruto had ruined his perfect state of being half asleep, he might as well just go along with the blonde's crazy ideas. "Sure," he replied and they both got up on their feet and trudged off to cabin "4."

Naruto was walking just a few steps behind Shikamaru when something strange caught his eye. "Hey, what happened to your back?" the blonde asked and started examining the other boy's back closer as they walked on.

"Huh? What's wrong with my back?" Shikamaru tried to look himself over his shoulder and down his back, but he was not able to see anything.

"You have red marks all over it. Did you get into a fight with a cat or something?" Naruto ran a finger over one of the swollen marks and Shikamaru bit his teeth together when the scratch began to sting. "When did you get this?"

Shikamaru gave up trying to see what Naruto was talking about and looked ahead of himself again. "I don't know, but it wasn't there this morning. At least I think Sasuke would have pointed it out to me if it was."

"Man, that's strange."

"Yeah. Especially because I didn't feel it until now." Shikamaru began to wonder when and how he had gotten those scratches. I did not make any sense. He had not been in a fight or anything. The only memory he had of being scratched was when Sasuke had done it while massaging him. But that was only a small scratch. Maybe Naruto was just exaggerating it.

When they got to the cabin, Shikamaru went to the bathroom immediately to check out his back in the mirror. Naruto was right. There were red marks everywhere.

"What the hell?" Shikamaru whispered under his breath and twisted one arm behind his back to touch the one of the scratches. _Weird. When did this happen?_ he thought and let his arm drop down to his side again. It had to have happened recently. It was definitely not there the day before. Had not he felt it because of the pain killer he had taken?

He turned his front back towards the mirror and his gaze met its reflection. When he saw the corner of his lips that was turned downwards, he could not help but think of Hinata again. It could not be his looks that was repelling her, could it?

Shikamaru was a sensible guy and he knew that he was not that bad looking. But if Naruto was more attractive than himself that was something that he would never be able to answer. It was not like Naruto was ugly either. Could his boisterous and encouraging persona really be what attracted Hinata? In that case, Shikamaru would never be the man for her. It would be too troublesome to change that much. In fact, he did not even believe that one person would be able to change that much about himself. Did he even want to change to win her love? Probably not. He liked himself the way he was. Hinata was a nice girl and he kind of liked her, but he would get over her. There were lots of other women in this world. He would just have to find the right one for him. He was sure that Naruto and Hinata would make the perfect couple anyway, even though that pairing might have appeared odd to most people in their class.

"Hey, Shikamaru, are you coming or not? The camera is ready!" Naruto yelled from Shikamaru's bedroom and suddenly the brunette was very happy that they were alone in the cabin. He did not want the others to know what Naruto and him had been doing. They would probably think that they were weird, which Shikamaru already did himself, but he did not need others to confirm it.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm coming," he said and took one last look in the mirror, sending himself a false though cheerful smile before joining up with Naruto who had prepared everything.

They both sat on Shikamaru's bed, the wire of the charger being just long enough for the camera to reach them.

"I can't wait to see what sort of strange things you and Sasuke do when you're asleep!" Naruto said excitedly and bounced up and down on his butt on the edge of the mattress.

"I already told you, don't expect anything special to happen. We're just sleeping."

"I know, but somethings gotta happen. Why else would you have such a sore back in the morning?" Shikamau did not even care to answer that question again and settled with motioning for Naruto to get started.

Naruto hit play and began watching the small screen intensely. Shikamaru pretended not to care and only glanced at it once in a while. He was curious, but not so curious that he could not restrain himself from acting like Naruto.

"There's not even anyone in the room yet. Fast forward," Shikamaru demanded and dropped his arms onto his thighs lazily. Naruto just nodded and did as he was told. They sat watching nothing but an empty room for a few seconds before suddenly the door flung open and Sasuke stepped inside. Naruto paused it and let it play in its normal pace. "Hey, don't stop fast forwarding, I'm not even in there yet!"

"No, I wanna see this. Sasuke knew that almost everyone had gone outside and wouldn't be coming back anytime soon so he would have your room all to himself. Who knows what crazy stuff he's gonna do?" Naruto had an evil grin on his face and he laughed inhumanely. Shikamaru just blew out a small amount of air through the tiny space between his lower lip and teeth in an annoyed manner.

"Wake me if something happens," he said and leaned his back against the wall, closing his eyes that radiated nothing else but indifference.

"Sure," Naruto answered and kept on watching. A moment went by without anything happening, Sasuke was just making himself ready for bed. But then suddenly... Naruto nudged Shikamaru's in the chest with his elbow. "Look at this. What the hell is he doing?"

Shikamaru got back into a sitting position with a straight back and took a look at the camera screen. Sasuke stood by Shikamaru's nightstand with a bottle of pills in his hands. "Oh, that's just his sleeping pills. That bastard is probably gonna use the water I prepared for myself to get them down." Shikamaru leaned against the wall again, but then something hit him. The glass had been full when Shikamaru had returned. Why would Sasuke first drink Shikamaru's water and then bother to go fill it up again? Could not he just have gone and gotten himself a new glass in the first place then?

"S-Shikamaru?" Naruto stuttered without turning his head to look at Shikamaru. The brunette noticed that the blonde's body had frozen up. He did not like this weird vibe he was getting from the situation.

Shikamaru sat up and looked at the screen. Sasuke was lying in his bed. The glass was still full.

Then Naruto looked at him with one brow raised and he had a kind of scared look in his eyes. "You said that was your water, right?" Shikamaru nodded unwillingly, wishing that it had not been his after all. "Well... Uhm... Does Sasuke know that?"

The brunette nodded again, "I... I think he does. Why?"

Naruto gulped and glanced back at the screen. "Sasuke... He just crushed two pills and mixed them with your water." Shikamaru felt a lump starting to form in his throat and his palms began to feel sweaty.

Both boys looked at the screen, not saying another word to each other. Naruto began fast forwarding again after gathering his thoughts. Judging by the stunned and nervous expression on Shikamaru's face, Naruto had already guessed that the boy had drank that water the night before. But why was Sasuke doping him? Shikamaru was not a nuisance during night. Was he?

Shikamaru brought one of his ring fingers to his mouth and started biting his nail uneasily. This was not the first time Sasuke had done this. He was sure of it already. Some of the puzzle pieces had fallen into place. That morning when everyone had had troubles with waking Shikamaru, it was the morning after the night where he had stolen one of Sasuke's sleeping pills. Since he had been able to wake up without trouble this morning, he could most highly conclude that he had gotten a small overdose that night he had taken one without Sasuke knowing about it. Maybe that was why Sasuke had put an effort into waking him that morning. He did not know about the consumption of the third pill and probably thought that it was his fault that Shikamaru had not been able to wake up. He had felt guilty. Or maybe he was afraid that someone would find out about what he was doing? But what was it he was actually doing? Why did he slip Shikamaru those pills? That was the only question Shikamaru could not seem to find an answer to, which annoyed him a great deal since he was sure that he had been able to figure out the rest already. What was Sasuke's motive?

They stared at the screen as it fast forwarded. They saw that Shikamaru entered the room, drank the water, changed into his night clothes and went to bed. The two boys were getting anxious, but both tried not to show the other. Shikamaru did not want Naruto to know that sweat was making its way to his forehead because he just did not like to show signs of weakness. Naruto, on the other hand, did not want to upset Shikamaru any further and therefore he tried to hide his hopelessly fluttering eyes.

Naruto and Shikamaru cocked their heads in confusion on the exact same time. Sasuke was getting out of bed... Why?

Their eyes gradually widened and their jaws dropped in that same pace as their eyes was getting closer to popping out of their heads. Naruto could not hold his gasp back any longer. It was now Shikamaru who had frozen up in his place.

Sasuke had removed the quilt from Shikamaru's sleeping figure and placed himself above him. He was stripping away the brunette's clothes.

When the black haired boy started doing something Shikamaru and Naruto did not even consider themselves old enough to do or watch yet, Naruto dropped the camera in a mix of shame and astonishment, jumping up from the bed. So that was how Shikamaru had gotten those scratches on his back!

"S-Shika-m-maru... W-We h-have to g-get Iruka-s-sensei!" Naruto stammered heavily and looked down at his dumbfounded friend who did not react at first. Only stared into space. But when Shikamaru finally snapped out of it and he understood what it was that Naruto was suggestion, he got up onto his feet in a split second and grabbed Naruto roughly by the shoulders.

He stared into the blonde's frustrated blue eyes. The brunette looked dead serious. "You can _not_ tell Iruka-sensei about this. You can _not_ tell anyone about this. Understood?"

"B-But S-Shikamaru? We n-need to tell I-Iruka-sensei w-what S-S-Sasuke did t-to you," his demand sounded more like a question and he had a hard time speaking the black haired boy's name out loud. Naruto had no idea of what to think or do, but they could not just pretend like nothing had happened, could they?

"Don't," he said simply, his eyes being begging, but somehow he also managed to make them look determined of his decision. Naruto gulped and nodded slowly. What did Shikamaru plan on doing? The brunette turned away from Naruto and began walking out of the room. He paused in the doorway. "Get rid of that," he said flatly, referring to the video of him and Sasuke. "Iruka will be expecting us to show up for the rest of out kitchen duty soon." He then walked off, leaving Naruto in a perplexed state of mind.

What was wrong with Shikamaru? Was he denying what had happened? Was he in shock? Or was he really just indifferent about what they had just seen? No, the rest was not the case. It had to be one of the other options. How could he just walk off like that? Was he even thinking clear? Naruto was watching Shikamaru through the open door as the brunette exited the cabin. He was not so sure that he would be able to keep this from his sensei, but on the other hand, he had no idea of how to tell something like this to him either. But was Shikamaru really planning on handling this himself? And how?

Naruto was in two minds. What should he do?

**oOooOooOo**

**Shiiit! I only just managed to get this posted in time for my deadline xD I'm REALLY sorry about that, I didn't mean for it to draw out like this. I'll try to update earlier in the day when the next update is up, which will be on Friday (hopefully, since I haven't written the 5th chapter yet so I can't really promise anything :s But I'll do everything that I can do to make it in time for my deadline! At least I've managed to update every third day so far^^!)  
**

**And I still manage to keep the length of the chapters this long! I'm freaking proud of myself since I've never written a story with THIS long chapters xD?**

**Oh well... What do you think of this chapter and the story overall so far :)? I always appreciate whatever critique you people might have in store for me :D**

**Nothing left to say than see ya' next Friday ^^!**


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

Shikamaru lay in his bed on his side, face turned towards the wall. He tried to act as normal as possible. That was his strategy – so far at least.

The moon was now the only source of light left in the room and everyone had gone to bed. Including a certain black haired boy. Shikamaru had a plan, though. He was not going to fall asleep like everyone had done already presumably. he was going to keep himself awake and catch Sasuke red-handed. The brunette could not be sure that his roommate would actually attempt to do anything with him again. He only had prove against him for one night. The idea of him doing it every night for as long as they had been on the excursion was only a theory, even though everything was pointing towards it.

Shikamaru went through all the possibilities of how the night could unfold again. He had done this exactly twelve times already and he knew his plan and options as well as he knew the back of his own hand, he was just making sure that there was no blind spots; no unpleasant surprises that he would not be able to foresee.

It was hard to try and figure out how your opponent was going to react when you did not really know them that well. Shikamaru thought he had known enough about Sasuke to analyze him and his moves, but once he had begun to plan out his own moves for the night, he found it rather difficult to set himself in the black haired boy's place. Until that day, he had never thought or even considered that Sasuke would do something like that to another boy or actually any other human being. Sure, it had been a different story if Shikamaru had been a girl, but even then he could not imagine that Sasuke would go to such lengths as drugging his victim. And why did he even have those lusts? He was eleven just like everyone else in his class. It was not normal for someone his age to be thinking along those lines yet.

A little background story about the Uchiha would not have hurt knowing when Shikamaru developed his theories and plans. That way he would have been able to figure out why Sasuke took actions that were so out of character and not to mention risky even for his unpredictable persona.

The brunette had always thought that the other boy had had a dark mind. Even before his clan was murdered, he had that mysterious, gloomy thinking pattern. It always seemed like he was pushing himself to the limit in order to become a better ninja. The best to be more exact. But what for? Was it to compensate for something? In that case, compensate for what? Shikamaru had heard small bits about the famous Uchiha clan – Sasuke's family in particular since his father, Fugaku Uchiha, was the head of the police force and his older brother, Itachi Uchiha, was a hotshot.

Word was out that Itachi was in the ANBU. Not that Shikamaru was supposed to know that kind of stuff, but his father was good at ferreting out information or at least just rumors like that one. And once his father was among friends and got drunk, Shikamaru would hear all sorts of stories. He did not even have to strain himself, like eavesdropping or something like that. He could stand right beside his father and the older man would not even notice him. Sometimes it was good to have such an ignorant father. He only noticed things when he really wanted to. He did not bother to try and keep secrets like Itachi possibly being in the ANBU from Shikamaru since his father knew that the brunette was not a talker and he was lazy just like himself so he was not a threat. He was not going to go and ramble out about everything his father had said to all and sundry. Shikamaru was now thankful for that. Even though the small amount information he had was not actually going to help him that much.

The only things he could conclude from what he knew about Sasuke's family was that there were probably high expectations for him from the beginning because of his brother. Expectations he could not live up to since it is rare that there is born more than one genius in the same family right after the other. That was a lot of pressure to put on a young boy like Sasuke. But why would that drive him to do what he had done to Shikamaru?

The brunette froze when he heard his roommate shift around in his bed. He held his breath for a few seconds until he felt like it was okay to breathe again. False alarm. Sasuke was not going to make his move... yet... if he was even going to.

Shikamaru closed his eyes and put the tips of his fingers on both hands together underneath his quilt. He needed to be in his best thinking position in order to look for any possible miscalculations.

If Sasuke had intended on approaching Shikamaru the way he had the night before, the brunette had made sure that nothing would change the other boy's mind. He had placed his nightly glass of water on the nightstand as he always did and gone out of the bedroom while Sasuke was still in there, making sure to let the other boy know that he was going to be out for a while. That way Sasuke would figure that he had time to pulverize the pills and mix them with Shikamaru's water. That was the first step of his plan and luckily it seemed to be a success.

The next step was to make sure that Sasuke thought that Shikamaru had drunk the water. The brunette would not be able to carry out the rest of his plan – which he needed to be awake in order to perform – if he actually drank the hypnotic water. The way Shikamaru got around that was to drink the water after making sure that Sasuke had had the chance to drug it if that was what he wanted to do and then go to the bathroom afterward. Fortunately Sasuke was already in bed at that time. Shikamaru had already figured out that he would be since he was always one of the first ones to be in bed and supposedly be asleep.

When Shikamaru had reached the bathroom, he immediately turned on the water so it would be heard above the sounds Shikamaru was going to make. Just in case that Sasuke was standing

behind the bathroom door, listening to what Shikamaru was doing. The brunette then stuck two fingers down his throat and threw up everything he had drunk including some of the dinner he had had earlier that evening.

Everything had so far gone as Shikamaru had planned out and if nothing had happened that he did not know about, then Sasuke would officially think that Shikamaru would be available and at his service for the night once he had gone to bed too. That was the situation Shikamaru was in now. He was waiting. Waiting for Sasuke to make his next bold move.

Shikamaru had already mentally prepared himself for the moment when Sasuke would actually get out of bed and go on with his selfish and disgusting nightly habit. He knew that he had gotten everything down in theory and he felt ready. But he was not sure if he was actually going to be able to carry out his plan in practice. He knew himself well, but he could not possibly foresee how he was going to react once Sasuke was in the same bed as him and Shikamaru would not know what to expect next. Would he freeze up? Panic and fight loudly? Or would he be able to keep his cool?

There was more than one way of approaching Shikamaru's current plan. Everything depended on how Shikamaru would act in practice and how Sasuke would react to Shikamaru's apparent resistance.

Shikamaru wanted to avoid having a long confrontation at all costs. It was embarrassing enough as it was and he was kind of still in the denial phase. He acknowledged what Sasuke had done to him, but in some ways he still could not believe that what had happened was reality. Sasuke had done wrong and was to pay for it. That was about the only thing that was on the brunette's mind – or that how he wanted it to be at least. He purposefully did not think about what kind of social, physical and mental consequences the happenings would cause himself nor Sasuke. He just wanted to get this over with. He wanted to let Sasuke know that he knew what he had done and that he wanted it to end right there and then.

Sasuke shifted in his place again and Shikamaru immediately exited his strategy-planning stand, but kept his eyes closed. It was not easy to pretend to be asleep, it was actually a lot harder than it seemed. At least if you wanted your act to look believable.

His body tensed up a little, but he quickly forced it back into being relaxed. He could not lie like that if he wanted Sasuke to truly believe that he was asleep.

When Shikamaru heard the sound of a bare foot connecting with a wooden floor, he knew Sasuke was on his way. The time had come. The brunette could only wish that everything would go as he had planned out and he mentally crossed his fingers, hoping that Naruto would keep calm as well and stay out of it. The last thing he needed was for others to get involved. He would end this on his own, using his own methods.

Planning out a strategy was Shikamaru's strong point. He had taken all his own and Sasuke's abilities, strengths and weaknesses into consideration. Carefully calculating the outcome of every possible situation.

If Sasuke was to make a violent approach, he would have the advantages at some points. For example, it was a sure fact that Sasuke had a lot more physical strength than Shikamaru had so battling him would only get the ball on Sasuke's court. But on the other side, if he was violent, he was more likely to be noisy and Shikamaru did not find it hard to figure that revealing himself and his motives to the world was the last thing that Sasuke wanted to do. So if he really was going to approach the brunette like that, he could simply scream for help. He would rather get around that, though, since it would hurt his pride too much. But Sasuke probably did not see him as a man with pride so maybe a simple threat to do so would be enough to make Sasuke back off? The black haired boy probably would not put it past Shikamaru to act like that. All cowardly and lazy, making everyone else come to his rescue so he would not have to do any of the work himself.

In contrast, if Sasuke chose to just acknowledge that Shikamaru now knew of his secret and just backed off, then all of the brunette's deliberations would be wasted, but at least it would be over soon and without any major obstacles to overcome.

Shikamaru could only come up with one other scenario and that was Sasuke trying to talk him into having sex with him, but he highly doubted that anything like that would happen. He had not even bothered to give it that much thought since he just could not wrap his head around that happening. Also, if that was the case, it would develop into either the first or second scenario anyway. When Shikamaru refused, Sasuke might try and take what he desired by force, but he could also just accept Shikamaru's no and take the refusal and humiliation as his punishment. At least that was the deal Shikamaru was willing to make with him. As long as this would never be repeated or spoken of ever again.

The second scenario was definitely the one Shikamaru was going to aim for to happen. Both parts would gain most from it. If force was brought into the mix, either Sasuke or Shikamaru would lose. They could even end up both being losers. Sasuke might be able to get what he wanted by force, but if Shikamaru ever told anyone about it, Sasuke would be doomed. And Shikamaru had a witness so he was pretty much covered. Unless of course Sasuke would go as far as taking the brunette's life. But he would not. Would he? Sure, he was to be a shinobi and that was what shinobi did. And the boy seemed pretty cold-blooded already so it was likely to happen. But he was still young and if he was going to try and kill Shikamaru, he would most definitely fight back and they would end up arousing the entire house and they would without a doubt take Shikamaru's side. So Sasuke would be outnumbered and Shikamaru would again have the upper hand.

Sasuke would not just lose all of his pride, but what he had done was straight out illegal and therefore there would be consequences. They would probably kick him out of the academy, which meant he would never officially be able to become a shinobi and probably never surpass his brother. Shikamaru was not sure of how they would punish him besides from them that. They could not exactly put a boy at his age in jail, but he was sure that they were going to take away everything that meant anything to Sasuke and that was punishment enough in Shikamaru's mind. He did not care if they did anything to him physically or not. Playing around with someone mentally was usually the best way of breaking someone.

_Here it goes,_ Shikamaru thought when he heard the black haired boy's other foot dropping to the floor. He was prepared. After going through all of his options and his plan again, he was not as scared anymore. As he felt now, he was ready for about anything.

Sasuke dragged his feet all the way over to Shikamaru's bed and he did not pause until he was right beside it. The black haired boy stooped and looked at Shikamaru's content face. It seemed like he was sleeping and Sasuke figured it was safe to continue. After all, he had seen Shikamaru drink the water with the pills in it and he had waited around two hours already so he had already guessed that the Nara would be asleep by then.

Shikamaru felt how his heart slowly began to pond harder and faster when his quilt was lifted above his body and cold air was let in under it, chilling his naked upper body. He tried to calm himself, but no matter what he thought about, he just could not get his heart rate under control. He just hoped that Sasuke would not notice. Up until now, he considered his act otherwise flawless.

It only took a few seconds for the coolness to be replaced with warmth once again. Only this was not the warmth caused by Shikamaru's quilt, but the warmth radiating from a hot, willing body. Shikamaru squeezed his eyes tighter together, he was already well on his way of blowing his cover. He had to keep calm. He _had _to.

Sasuke let one hand slide underneath Shikamaru's arm and onto the other boy's stomach, pressing his bare chest against the brunette's back. Shikamaru strained himself so he would not react. He just needed to hold on for another minute and it would be time to confront Sasuke.

The black haired boy breathed on Shikamaru's neck, the cool air also reaching down his spine. Shikamaru bit the inside of his cheek - the side which lay on the pillow so there was only a minimal chance that Sasuke would notice. He did not seem to catch onto Shikamaru's response, he only nuzzled his face against the other boy's neck. Shikamaru was now past feeling uncomfortable. He felt mortified and harassed.

Shikamaru fossilized when a short peck was placed on his shoulder and Sasuke's hand glided up his body until it reached the brunette's chest. If he felt Shikamaru's pulse, would he figure it out? No, Shikamaru could not let Sasuke beat him to it, he had to do something now. It was time. But something was wrong. Shikamaru could not move. Not one limp. Not the slightest movement even in his pinky could be forced out. For a second, he considered if Sasuke had put him in some sort of genjutsu, but then he started thinking rationally again and assured himself that Sasuke had not learned anything like that yet and he had to comprehend that it was actually just himself that was keeping him from turning around and confronting Sasuke. His body had stiffened up. He was terrified of what was happening and what was to happen to him.

Sasuke pressed them closer to each other, placing another cautious and light kiss on Shikamaru's shoulder. It was the last night they were going to be spending in the cabin and Sasuke intended on enjoying it to the fullest. Who knew when an opportunity like this one would pop up again.

He started drawing small circles with the tips of his fingers on Shikamaru's chest and began kissing him up and down his shoulder and neck. It felt nice to be this close to someone else. Something Sasuke had never experienced with anyone else than his mother both physically and mentally. No one other than her cared for him. Not even when his clan was still alive. People were nice to him, it was not that that was the problem. It was just that the only two individuals who never seemed to want to recognize him and his abilities were the only two that he truly wanted to be accepted by. His father and his older brother. He longed after contact. Physical contact. Approval. Acceptance. He sank his teeth into Shikamaru's neck when thinking back at his family and pressed him even closer. In moments like these, all he wanted was to become one with the person lying next to him.

Nails was driven under the skin of Shikamaru's chest and he jerked by accident. Sasuke did not seem to expect anything less, though, and kept on boring his nails even deeper into the brunette. He bit harder down at his neck in frustration. Just the thought of Itachi made him angry enough to hurt another human being like this. Sasuke did not know where this unwanted desire came from. He never thought that he was into boys, but when Shikamaru was just lying there, all helpless, he could not keep himself from taking advantage of it. He needed this even if the need could not be explained. At least he did not know why himself. He was driven merely by lust. He only took what he wanted. He only took what he needed. There was nothing more to it.

Sasuke exhaled heavily and he drew back his claws and let his hand brush down Shikamaru's body instead. He paused shortly when reaching the edge of his pants. He tried to strain himself from going any further, but was not able to do it for more than a quick moment. He only got one finger under the brunette's pants, though, before the other boy reacted all of a sudden, grabbing onto Sasuke's wrist. The black haired boy's entire body jerked in surprise and Shikamaru slowly turned around so they were lying face to face instead.

Shikamaru eyes were still closed. This was so surrealistic to him. He could not comprehend the situation fully and could now see that figuring out his counterattack in theory was a hell of a lot easier than actually doing it in practice. He had to calm down. There was no way around it now. He had already let Sasuke know that he was awake. There was only one step left before Sasuke would give his reaction to this and Shikamaru's plan would have to adjust to it accordingly.

He opened his eyes, looking directly into the confused, black eyes of Sasuke. The black haired boy's eyes were widened and his jaw had slightly dropped, but he did not do anything else than just stare into Shikamaru's eyes.

Shikamaru kept holding onto his wrist as he sent him a knowing look. He did not appear warningly. Just well-informed. All he was waiting for was for Sasuke to choose a reaction so their act could go on. But he did not do anything, he just stared at him stunningly, not getting how Shikamaru could be awake. Not getting how he could know. Not believing that the situation had just turned into something that he had never thought possible. He had been so careful. Well, most of the time, until his feelings took over. Those times where he was not really thinking.

The brunette was surprised to find out that he probably was not going to get a reaction from Sasuke unless he guided him out of his bed. He had not thought this case scenario through. He would have expected at least some kind of reaction. Not just dead silence.

There was a bright, but short, blink of light outside their window. Five seconds after, a loud roar filled out the silence, soon followed by the sound of heavy rain hitting the roof and windows.

Naruto awoke with a jerk. He took a second to orientate himself of his surroundings and was relieved to discover that it was only thunderstorm that had aroused him. He sat up in his bed without moving out of the spot for a moment. A dream was bugging him. He had dreamt that something bad was going to happen to Shikamaru. It was not just the dream that had given him this feeling, though, he had had it ever since Shikamaru had decided to take matter into his own hands.

The blonde looked up at his sensei who was still asleep in his bed. Naruto's mattress had not dried off yet when they were headed for bed so Iruka had found a spare thin, inflatable mattress that Naruto could sleep on instead. Naruto had only been happy when Iruka had told him that he could sleep in his cabin for the night. Iruka had felt like an idiot for thinking that Naruto and Kiba would actually be able to hit it off with each other if he just forced them to be together and so this was his way of apologizing. Naruto did not really care were he slept, as long as it was not in the same room as Kiba, but he found the atmosphere rather cozy when sleeping in the same cabin as his sensei.

Naruto bit his lip lightly and kept staring at his teacher. Should he tell him?

A lightning struck down and the din of it soon followed.

Shikamaru was still staring into the black eyes of his assaulter. Sasuke had not moved one single centimeter after Shikamaru had let him know that he was awake. The brunette was getting tired of lying in that uncomfortable position with Sasuke and decided that the night would not move on unless he did something to make it do so.

"I'm tired. Go back to your own bed," he let go of Sasuke's wrist, looking at him for another short moment before turning his attention away from the Uchiha and closing his eyes.

Sasuke stared at him, not knowing what to do. Shikamaru knew what had happened. He knew what Sasuke had done to him. His reaction, his eyes, that look, they all told the same story.

Shikmaru tried to calm himself when he could not feel the other boy leaving his bed. What was taking him so long, why would he not he just leave? He had caught him in the act. The best thing for him was to drop it all now that the brunette had silently offered him a way out of that sticky situation.

He was relived when Sasuke finally snapped out of it and started moving behind, but could not believe what happened next. Sasuke grabbed Shikamaru's shoulder and forced him onto his back, quickly crawling on top of him.

"Sasuke, what are you doing? Get off," Shikamaru demanded, trying to push Sasuke off, but without luck.

The black haired boy snatched the other boy's arms and held onto them tightly. "Does anyone else besides you know?" he asked in a low tone, his intense gaze feeling like daggers to Shikamaru.

The brunette was the stunned one now. He had kind of thought of the scenario ending out in something like this, but he knew Sasuke was a smart guy and as Shikamaru saw it, the smartest thing to do was to just let it go. What was he doing? And what was Shikamaru supposed to do now? If he told Sasuke the truth, he might freak out and become even more violent, but on the other hand, he might just back off because he would then know that the show would be over. As long as he did not tell him who or how many knew about it, he would still be the one with the upper hand.

"Yeah," he answered with a serious look on his face, watching as Sasuke brought one hand to his lips, nervously biting one finger nail. He looked away from Shikamaru. The brunette was not sure of what to do. He had no idea of how Sasuke was going to react next since he had not exactly chosen the most sensible way out at first. Hopefully he was going to reconsider his violent approach.

Sasuke looked back at Shikamaru and stopped biting his nail. "I guess this is my last chance then," he said.

"Wait... Wha..." Shikamaru did not understand what the black haired boy meant, but Sasuke made sure that his point came across when he suddenly flipped Shikamaru onto his stomach and pulled his arms behind his back. "Sasuke, stop! What are you doing?" he asked suprisedly. Sasuke knew better than to do what Shikamaru was afraid that he was about to do.

Sasuke ripped out the pull string from his night trousers and tied Shikamaru's hands with it, making a shinobi reversed butterfly knot so he would not have a chance at escaping.

"Sasuke, stop!" Shikamaru repeated and wrenched underneath the other boy. "Get off me now or I'll scream!"

"I would love to see you try," the other boy said flatly and grabbed the cover of Shikamaru's pillow, ripping it off before gagging him with it. "No one will hear you now. Especially not with this thunderstorm going on." Shikamaru's eyes widened and he wrenched wildly, screaming as loud as he could, but it was muffled down by the fabric in his mouth.

The frightened boy, who thought he had had thought the situation through down to the smallest detail, was now lying on his stomach, looking over his shoulder at Sasuke. An evil grin was spreading all over his face. Shikamaru was just lying there in front of him. Defenseless and pathetic. He could use him for what ever he wanted.

The black haired boy then tugged the brunette's pants off in one sweep motion, the victim crying out in a mix of embarrassment and anxiety. Sasuke pressed Shikamaru's legs underneath his stomach so his butt was pointing straight up. He was now completely exposed and ready for what Sasuke needed him for.

When Sasuke spit in his hand and brought it down to his own member afterward, Shikamaru's eyes widened even further and he complained as loudly as he could, but he was not able to speak clear enough for Sasuke to make out one single word of what he was saying.

This was embarrassing. Or rather, it was humiliating. Shikamaru tried to worm his way out of the position Sasuke had forced him into, but Sasuke hit him right on one of his shoulder blades and held him back so he would not be able to get any further away from him. Shikamaru caught a glimpse of the hungry look in the stronger boy's eyes. That was when he finally realized what was going to happen to him. He would not be able to get away.

Only a second after thinking those thoughts, a pain shot through Shikamaru's body and he screamed out in agony. Sasuke was holding him by his hips, thrusting himself inside Shikamaru. The brunette tried to wiggle out his hands from the knot around it, but he had no luck with it and he cried out again when Sasuke pulled out before thrusting right back into him. The pain was unbelievable, the humiliation was unbearable and the fear Shikamaru felt was not easy to miss. This was all too much for an eleven year old to handle and the brunette could not keep the tears from making their way to his eyes when the pain shot through his body yet again.

He tried to shout out Sasuke's name, but he still could not get the sound past the cover. Sasuke then bend forward and grabbed the boy's loose, long hair, tugging his head backwards, never stopping what he had going on between his aching third leg and Shikamaru's sore butt,

"You have no idea what it's like," Sasuke whispered angrily into Shikamaru's ear. "You have no idea what it's like to be me. All the expectations people have towards you and you're completely alone because nobody really cares about you. Can you imagine what they would suddenly think of me if they knew... If they knew what I'm really like?" Sasuke thrust into Shikamaru and the boy let out another scream. The black haired Uchiha did not enjoy this, but he could not get himself to stop. He bit down at his lip when an image of his brother appeared in his head.

Sasuke was supposed to be strong, cool, handsome, smart and all in all a promising student. But if anybody knew about his secret, they would look down at him. Gay people were not those things. At least people did not think they were. The boy could not help but imagine what would happen if his older brother ever found out about his unnatural desire. He would laugh him right into his face and tell him that he was worthless, disgusting and that someone like him would never be able to beat the great Itachi. The man who slaughtered his entire clan.

The assaulter's hands traveled down to the brunette's hips where he dug his nails into the other boy's skin. He was so angry with himself. What was wrong with him? Tears threatened to take over his eyes, but he held them back. He was not going to be that weak. Instead, he banged into Shikamaru who immediately screamed and pressed his head down the pillow in shame.

"Don't take this the wrong way, this has nothing to do with you as a person, Shikamaru," Sasuke hissed furiously. "Frankly, I don't care about you at all." The Uchiha did not lie when telling the brunette that it was nothing personal. He just wanted to make sure that Shikamaru understood that he was nothing special to him. Merely a toy that was to be at his service at anytime.

Shikamaru closed his eyes tightly and tried to hold back his sobs, the tears caused by the pain still streaming down his face. He wished that Sasuke would just stop already. He could not take it anymore. If Sasuke had been this rough with him every night, it was pretty obvious why he had had such strong back pains every single morning.

Sasuke growled loudly when pulling out and covering himself with his pants again. He was even angrier with himself now than before. He had done this every night to Shikamaru throughout the entire excursion, but now he could not even finish what he had started all of a sudden. The fact that Shikamaru was awake and aware of what was happening made the difference.

"Kami," Sasuke snarled through his teeth and clutched to his head. What was happening to him? He had to get out of there now. Shikamaru knew about everything and he had said that he was not the only one who did. When Sasuke had chosen to literally rape Shikamaru, he was done for good right there and then. He could not stay there. He did not even want to know what they would do to him if he did.

"Hurry sensei!" Naruto shouted as he and Iruka ran towards cabin "4" through the storm as fast as they could. The blonde had not been able to keep his mouth shut in the end. He was afraid that Shikamaru would end up getting hurt and when this bad feeling he had in his stomach would not disappear, he at last awoke Iruka and told him everything.

The two of them barged into the boys' cabin, most likely arousing every single one in the cabin who were not awake already. When they reached Shikamaru and Sasuke's bedroom, they quickly realized that they were too late. Sasuke was nowhere to be found. The open window was the only track he had left behind.

Their eyes lowered till they hit a shivering figure that was lying on the bed. He was lying on his side, hands tied together behind his back, gagged and knees pressed up against his chest, hiding what he was able to hide of his naked body without using his hands.

"Shikamaru," Naruto whispered terrifyingly, not believing what his eyes was telling him. The boy on the bed was crying, his sobs could only just be heard.

Iruka squatted down beside the bed, immediately trying to untie the pre-genin, but the boy flinched at the teacher's slight touch and his body started trembling even more. Concerned eyes stared at him for a moment. What was Iruka supposed to do now?

For a moment Naruto and Iruka did not do anything else than watch the crying brunette whose pride was long gone.

The following morning Iruka had made sure everyone had packed and was ready to go by the time the bus arrived. They were all gathered at the meeting place when a leaf ninja suddenly jumped down from a branch, landing right beside Iruka.

"Good, you're finally here," Iruka said, greeting his fellow shinobi.

"Sorry it took me so long, my friend's nose here failed us several times on our way here," he apologized on behalf of his wrinkly, faithful companion. The dog send his silver haired master a huffy look.

"It's okay, Kakashi. Do you think you'll be able to find Sasuke?" the brunette asked in a concerned tone, looking away from the jounin and over at a certain vulnerable student.

"The rain might have washed away his scent, but Pakkun here should be able to give us at least some clue of where he went." The higher ranked jounin looked in the same direction as the chuunin he was speaking with, laying eyes on another brunette who was a lot younger than him and Iruka.

Shikamaru sat on a stub with his bags in front of him. Choji and Naruto sat on each their side of him, both wearing the same solicitous look. Naruto stretched out one hand and tried to put it on his peers shoulder, but Shikamaru shook it off immediately and turned away from him without one single word.

"It's him, isn't it?" asked the masked man as he turned back to Iruka who did not take his eyes of his scarred students. He nodded.

"Yes, that's him." The older man looked back at Shikamaru, observing how he tried to mentally shut out everyone around him.

"Has he always been like that?" Kakashi asked, Iruka finally turning his attention towards the taller man beside him.

"No... Ever since last night he haven't let anybody touch him. It's a miracle if he even let's you come near him. He won't talk to anybody either."

"Who knows about this?"

"Besides the hokage, you and me, only Naruto knows. I've already spoken with him and told him that he can't tell anybody about this. By the time the other students start asking questions about his behavior, we will have come up with a proper cover story to tell them."

"Sounds like a good plan to me."

The jounin and chuunin watched the Nara kid for a little while longer before someone suddenly spoke from behind them. Both men turned, immediately laying eyes on three female pre-genin whose hearts were literally visible in their eyes.

"Iruka-sensei, will you please sit next to me on the bus?" Ino asked with a voice filled with childish expectation.

"I was gonna ask Iruka-sensei if he would sit next to me!" Sakura and Hinata shouted in unison. It was the third time already that they had asked Iruka that question and he still did not get what was going on.

"Girls, will you please excuse Kakashi and me for a moment. I'll come back to you later," Iruka said firmly and the girls walked away unwillingly, still fighting over who got to sit next to the teacher on their way home.

Kakashi started chuckling all of a sudden and Iruka sent him a questioning look.

"What's so funny?" the chuunin asked, scratching the scar on the bridge of his nose.

"I see you have gotten yourself a fan club," he sent the shorter man his signature shut-eye smile.

Iruka's eyes followed the girls who was waving at him as they were walking backwards towards the bus. So that was what they were doing. They were flirting with him. How could he have been so blind?

A slight blush found its way to the younger man's cheeks and he began rubbing his nose more intensely. "What makes you think that?" he asked in a sheepish voice. He was more than just flattered to hear that three of his students had fallen for him. He was not even used to girls his own age falling heads over heels for him. It could not continue like this, though, so he needed to come up with a plan to make them start hating him again. Well, maybe not hate him, but he could not have them following him around everywhere. It would just end up making him irritated.

He could not keep himself from putting on a small smile when thinking of how he would get them off his back.

"Just look at them. I think what they're trying to do is pretty clear, at least to me, but that might just be due to experience." Iruka raised one brow at the silver haired self-important man. He did not just say that, did he? It only got worse when he continued, "I must say, though, I've never had any from that age rang," he chuckled, "Oh well, I should get going. Bye," he said and jumped away from the meeting place, the dog immediately taking its leading position in the front.

Iruka was left with a tomato red face and anger that he could not take out on anyone. "Who does that narcissistic idiot think he is? I sure don't hope any of my students ever gets to have him as their team leader!" the brunette mumbled irritably under his breath as he walked over to all of his students by the bus.

The academy teacher got everyone on the bus and made sure that Shikamaru would not be placed too far away from him. He wanted to keep an eye on the boy since he he had no idea of how he felt after what had happened the night before. He needed to make sure that he would be okay, even though he could see that this would definitely be affecting him for a long while. The tanned shinobi just hoped that Kakashi and Pakkun would find Sasuke so he could be brought to justice. Maybe that would calm Shikamaru's mind even if it was just a small comfort.

Iruka discretely crossed his fingers and wished that Shikamaru's fear of physical contact would not be a permanent mental impairment.

_**The end**_

**!SORRY ABOUT THE DELAY!**

**Wanna know what makes this kind of scary? It is actually based on a true story (or should I say urban legend?) **

**- When I went to a Danish efterskole, I was told that one year on the efterskole a boy had woken up every morning with a sore back and he could not figure out why. Not until he decided to record himself sleeping. That was when he discovered that his roommate was drugging him and then having sex with him while he himself was asleep. Pretty scary, huh xD? I find it rather disturbing.**

**I'm not sure if the story is actually true or not, even though it's known by lots of people and many people reassured me that it was in fact true. I still can't believe something like that could actually take place xD And if it did, I don't know what happened to any of the boys afterward and I don't know how the raped boy handled the situation after he had discovered the truth. I only know what I've told you just now.**

**By the way, I've been thinking of making a sequel for this story about what happens to Shikamaru afterward. I'm not sure that I'm going to do it though, but I just wanted to hear what you readers think of the idea?**

**Thank you for following the story. If you are interested in reading more of my work, so far I have 4 other Naruto related fics. 3 one shots and one – longer - on going story. **

**If you are a Shikamaru fan, I just wanna point out that I only have written one other story that contains him. It's called _Anything Else? _And it is the on going story I've already mentioned.**

**I hope you enjoyed reading this small piece and feel free to tell me what you think of the story. Oh, and don't hold yourself back if you have any kind of critique for me :)!**

**Hope to see you again ^^!**


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